Fifth Column: And Four Stories of the Spanish Civil War
by Ernest Hemingway 
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The three-act play and the hitherto uncollected stories contained in this book represent the first literary fruits of the active months (1937-1939) Ernest Hemingway spent in Spain covering the Spanish Civil War as a correspondent for the North American Newspaper Alliance and helping to film battle scenes for the motion picture The Spanish Earth. He conveys the feverish life in Madrid under siege: the daily horrors of the Rebel bombardment, the incongruous humor, the contest in duplicity and show more brutality between Loyalist counter-espionage agents and the fascist enemy within the city, the futility of trying to establish between a man and woman any relationship deeper or more permanent than casual sexual adventure. Each of the four stories depicts a different aspect of the war. show lessTags
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This collection, containing four short stories and the only play Ernest Hemingway published, is only for the completists. The play itself, 'The Fifth Column', is confusing and downright boring, with lots of the 'oh, shall we, darling?' type of interactions that will be very familiar to regular Hemingway readers. Usually, one can filter them out and focus on the good stuff Hemingway writes, but a play consisting largely of such interactions does strain one's tolerance. Aside from one nice line on page 67 – "You feel lovely. Sort of like a snow storm if snow wasn't cold and didn't melt." – the play is instantly forgettable.
The short stories are much better and go a long way towards redeeming the book. I didn't like 'The Butterfly and show more the Tank', which was rather an odd tale, but 'The Denunciation' has a good moral ending and 'Night Before Battle' is a social scene depicted seemingly as only Hemingway could. 'Under the Ridge' was a fine little story that wouldn't look out of place in Hemingway's great war novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. Each of the stories are capable of moving you, and I want to give the book a higher rating because of this, but at 100 pages the play takes up the bulk of the short publication and so it has to be judged predominantly on that. If you've enjoyed the side-dishes but was unimpressed by the main course, you can't say you've had a good meal. show less
The short stories are much better and go a long way towards redeeming the book. I didn't like 'The Butterfly and show more the Tank', which was rather an odd tale, but 'The Denunciation' has a good moral ending and 'Night Before Battle' is a social scene depicted seemingly as only Hemingway could. 'Under the Ridge' was a fine little story that wouldn't look out of place in Hemingway's great war novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. Each of the stories are capable of moving you, and I want to give the book a higher rating because of this, but at 100 pages the play takes up the bulk of the short publication and so it has to be judged predominantly on that. If you've enjoyed the side-dishes but was unimpressed by the main course, you can't say you've had a good meal. show less
Nice sentences. Maybe not Hemmingway's best, but still an entertaining read. The Hemmingway "fishbowl" reveals characteristics in man that are best encountered between-the-lines.
The fifth column is a play about the Spanish Civil War. Together with four short stories about that same period this book of just under 200 pages brings together Hemingway's works about the Spanish Civil War. Both the play and the short stories breathe strong authenticity.
I'm not a fan of Hemingway. I was bored out of my mind. I'm not sure these are even considered American Classics.
Some interesting tales from the Spanish Civil War.
Ambientada en un hotel de Madrid asesiado durante la Guerra Civil Española. Describe los sentimientos de un combatiente norteamericano que colabora con el contraespionaje de la República. .
Sep 6, 2018Spanish
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Books about the Spanish Civil War
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Author Information
653+ Works 173,109 Members
Ernest Miller Hemingway was born in the family home in Oak Park, Ill., on July 21, 1899. In high school, Hemingway enjoyed working on The Trapeze, his school newspaper, where he wrote his first articles. Upon graduation in the spring of 1917, Hemingway took a job as a cub reporter for the Kansas City Star. After a short stint in the U.S. Army as a show more volunteer Red Cross ambulance driver in Italy, Hemingway moved to Paris, and it was here that Hemingway began his well-documented career as a novelist. Hemingway's first collection of short stories and vignettes, entitled In Our Time, was published in 1925. His first major novel, The Sun Also Rises, the story of American and English expatriates in Paris and on excursion to Pamplona, immediately established him as one of the great prose stylists and preeminent writers of his time. In this book, Hemingway quotes Gertrude Stein, "You are all a lost generation," thereby labeling himself and other expatriate writers, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, T.S. Eliot, and Ford Madox Ford. Other novels written by Hemingway include: A Farewell To Arms, the story, based in part on Hemingway's life, of an American ambulance driver on the Italian front and his passion for a beautiful English nurse; For Whom the Bell Tolls, the story of an American who fought, loved, and died with the guerrillas in the mountains of Spain; and To Have and Have Not, about an honest man forced into running contraband between Cuba and Key West. Non-fiction includes Green Hills of Africa, Hemingway's lyrical journal of a month on safari in East Africa; and A Moveable Feast, his recollections of Paris in the Roaring 20s. In 1954, Hemingway won the Nobel Prize in Literature for his novella, The Old Man and the Sea. A year after being hospitalized for uncontrolled high blood pressure, liver disease, diabetes, and depression, Hemingway committed suicide on July 2, 1961, in Ketchum, Idaho. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Ernest Hemingway has a Legacy Library. Legacy libraries are the personal libraries of famous readers, entered by LibraryThing members from the Legacy Libraries group.
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Series
Belongs to Publisher Series
Oscar Narrativa (1299)
rororo (5173)
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Contains
Common Knowledge
- Canonical title
- Fifth Column: And Four Stories of the Spanish Civil War
- Original title
- The Fifth Column and Four Stories of the Spanish Civil War
- Original publication date
- 1969
- Important places
- Spain
- Important events
- Spanish Civil War (1936 | 1939)
- Original language
- English
Classifications
Statistics
- Members
- 370
- Popularity
- 84,339
- Reviews
- 6
- Rating
- (3.55)
- Languages
- 7 — Danish, English, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, Swedish
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 15
- ASINs
- 15
