The Search for Love and Feminine Identity in the War Literature of Ernest Hemingway and Tim O’Brien
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THE SEARCH FOR LOVE AND FEMININE IDENTITY IN THE WAR LITERATURE OF ERNEST HEMINGWAY AND TIM O’BRIEN Heather Renee Ross A dissertation submitted to the faculty of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of English and Comparative Literature. Chapel Hill 2011 Approved By: Joseph M. Flora Linda Wagner-Martin Fred Hobson Daniel Anderson Laurence Avery © 2011 Heather Renee Ross ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ii Abstract Heather Renee Ross: The Search for Love and Feminine Identity in the War Literature of Ernest Hemingway and Tim O’Brien (Under the direction of Joseph M. Flora) This dissertation examines how Ernest Hemingway and Tim O’Brien challenge the emotionally restrictive nature of our stereotypical expectations of manhood in the context of the war experience. The analysis centers on creating a feminist critical space that affirms the male desire for feminine influence. Though their methods differs, both Hemingway and O’Brien create male characters who seek freedom from the insistence that they perpetually be brave, strong, un-emotive, and otherwise “manly,” and freedom from the fear that such a “failure” to perform as expected will not signify that they are less than men. And yet these characters often are at war with themselves, as they struggle with how to endure suffering and loss and still perform as men. Hemingway develops characters who discover that to live and die well, a man must avail himself to the feminine, and be vulnerable to love. O’Brien demonstrates how a failure to listen—both to ourselves and to one another—thwarts love and prevents human closeness. This project uncovers Hemingway and O’Brien’s efforts to subvert traditional masculinity by urging the reader to imagine alternative expressions of masculinity and femininity, and to accept male characters whose thoughts and actions defy expectations for masculine performance. iii To Jason, for his love and light, and for knowing I need a room of my own. To Declan and Scout, for hanging the moon each and every night. iv Acknowledgements My work-through-the-night writing habits were only possible with the unwavering support of those who kept things alive, running, and inspired during the day. Thanks with all my heart to my husband and children, whose stress-dispelling laughter made everything lighter. I am also deeply grateful to my sister, Brittany, whose unwavering confidence and sanity checks reminded me to breathe each step of the way and, at last, to celebrate. Thank you to my parents, Ann and Mike Price, and my in-laws, Sue and Larry Ross, for their confidence in my ability to multi-task beyond reason, and for their willingness to fill in the gaps. My work was made easier with the help and understanding of my friends, who overlooked my frequent “absent” presence, and who gave everything from playdates and carpool runs, to encouragement and congratulations. It was Tom Hudgins, my eighth grade English teacher, who first led me to value and nurture that “special place” in my mind where “literary things happened.” I owe a debt of gratitude to my advisor, Joe Flora, who has been tough, demanding, and kind in precisely the right ways, and who insisted not only that I finish, but also that I finish well. I extend heartfelt thanks to Daniel Anderson, Laurence Avery, Keith Cushman, Fred Hobson, Erica Lindemann, Christian Moraru, James Thompson, Weldon Thornton, and Linda Wagner-Martin, for their scholar-shaping confidence, standards, and advice, and for genuinely caring about me as a person. And, finally, to my students—past, present, and future—who continue to teach me, and whose responses to literature are constant reminders that books matter. v Table of Contents Introduction…………………………………….………………...............................................1 Chapter I. A Soldier’s Search for Truth, Love, and Identity in Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried.........................................................................................12 II. The Male Desire for Feminine Influence in Ernest Hemingway’s Men Without Women...............................................................................................97 III. Ernest Hemingway’s Across the River and Into the Trees: You Can’t Well Be a Man Without Being Vulnerable to Love……………………....153 IV. Tim O’Brien’s Tomcat in Love: Hell Hath No Fury Like a Man Betrayed……………………………………………………………….…..189 Conclusion.............................................................................................................................225 Works Cited.......................................................................................................................... 230 vi Introduction Our children’s children—what of them? Who of them? New means must be discovered to find room for us under the sun. Shall this be done by war or can it be done by peaceful methods? -Ernest Hemingway, “Banal Story,” Men Without Women (126) I was born in Virginia Beach, Virginia to parents who were so convinced I was going to be a boy, that they had named me John and painted my room blue months before I arrived. From the time my parents shared these early life details with me, at the age of six, I think, the knowledge has colored my perception of self. I am not for a moment suggesting that this prenatal case of mistaken sexual identity had the same trauma-inducing effects that Ernest Hemingway experienced from his mother’s cross-dressing experiment with he and his sister, but neither do I really believe that my parents—my father, in particular—were convinced I was a boy. It was just they so desperately desired a boy, that in a way they tried to will me into being one. My parents didn’t love me any less for being a girl, nor my sister, who arrived two years later, but my father also was sure to instill in me a traditionally masculine perspective on my role in the world. When he pushed me to be strong, tough, independent, unemotional, competitive, and athletic, I embraced it as a way to prove that even though I was a girl, I could still be most, if not all, of the things he wanted his child to be. The truth is, it all came rather easily for me. I was tough and strong and fiercely competitive. I was a leader—the president of my class more than once and a varsity team captain several times. I was part of the first generation of girls to play co-ed recreational sports before there were girls-only teams, and I continued to play on teams through college. I was emotional, yet I learned how to submerge my emotions—to keep a stiff upper lip, and I was independent to a fault, and I still am today. What I wasn’t, however, was a feminist. In fact, in high school, and even into college, not being a feminist was a small source of pride for me. Whether I was sheltered, naïve, or simply in denial, I didn’t see anything in my life that I wasn’t able to do because I was a woman. From my vantage now, I am certain there were those sorts of things, but I didn’t see them then. The other thing I missed back then was the great extent to which the wants and expectations of a man—my father—influenced the choices I made. My parents were and still are conservative Christians. Growing up, I never had the idea that my mother, as a homemaker, to use the term she prefers, would have rather been doing anything else. There weren’t political magazines around our house to inform me of gender-based inequities or the social landscape from a liberal perspective, and certainly I didn’t hear it from the pulpit on Sunday mornings. When it came to feminism, it was not that I didn’t get what the fuss was all about, but that I didn’t even realize there was a fuss. While in high school, I read Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises in the classroom, and then For Whom the Bell Tolls and numerous short stories on my own. I admired Hemingway’s style, and I identified with his characters’ suffering and pain. In retrospect, I think I also liked Hemingway’s work in part because it afforded me a space to engage with the masculine ideas that were so familiar and comfortable to me, rather than confront my own difficulty in identifying with the feminine. In this way, Hemingway and I were a bit alike, for he too was employed in the subterfuge of avoiding his own femininity. Then, midway through my sophomore year in college, my entire perspective began to change. I read Charlotte Perkins 2 Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper in an English Lit course, and almost instantly my old view of literature and the world began to crack and peel. Feminism, I finally understood, was not only considerably more than a “fuss,” it was a thing essential to the woman I wanted to be. Today, I am a woman that back then I could only have imagined I would be. I am a feminist, and I also still like Hemingway. I am married to a man I met during that influential sophomore year in college, and it is no small source of pride for him that he introduced me to Sylvia Plath’s writing so many years ago. We have two small children, a boy and a girl, and we often find ourselves confronting societal expectations for gender as we contemplate our parenting decisions. Already, I have witnessed from them defiance for any sort of those expectations, and I must admit it leaves me proud. My seven-year-old son, who has near shoulder-length blond hair, was at first nonplussed when strangers mistook him for a girl; now he understands why they make the mistake, but he doesn’t care, and is especially against cutting his locks.