Plot Summary
In Our Time
Ernest Hemingway
In Our Time
Fiction | Short Story Collection | Adult | Published in 1925
Plot Summary
American author Ernest Hemingway’s first collection of short stories, In Our Time, has a complex publication history: author Ezra Pound commissioned the first stories for the 1923 edition of The Little Review. In 1924, Hemingway added twelve more stories and published in our time in Paris with a lowercase title. He added fourteen more stories for the popular 1925 edition, and another for an additional edition in 1930.
The short stories are organized in relative chronological order, weaving together in such a way that they tell one larger story. Most are about Nick Adams and begin with a memoir that leads to a story. The first story, “On the Quai in Smyrna,” is placed before Chapter 1 to set the tone for the whole narrative. It follows the evacuation of Greek troops after a defeat by the Turkish army from the point of view of an American officer aboard a ship.
In the Chapter 1 story “Indian Camp,” Nick Adams and his doctor father interrupt their vacation to attend to an Indian woman who is about to give birth. His father successfully performs a cesarean section only to find out the father of the baby has committed suicide.
In “The Doctor and the Doctors Wife,” Nick’s father hires an Indian man to saw logs that have rolled onto his land. The man refers to the logs as “stolen property,” which leads to an argument between the two men. Nick is only a boy and discovers himself choosing sides in the argument. The stories in Chapters 3 and 4 follow the breakup between teenager Nick and his girlfriend.
“The Battler” finds Nick hitchhiking via train when the brakeman discovers him and kicks him off the train. In ‘A Very Short Story,’ Nick is wounded in battle and recounts a love affair with his wartime nurse.
“Soldier’s Home” veers away from Nick, instead, focusing on a returned soldier Krebs, who does nothing but practice the clarinet and play pool. One day, he decides to move to Kansas City to find a job. In “The Revolutionist,” a Hungarian communist en route to Switzerland is arrested in Italy.
In “Mr. and Mrs. Eliot,” Hubert Eliot is a stuffy postgraduate poet who saves himself for the woman he will marry until, at twenty-five, he marries a woman much like himself in temperament. They move to France, where he is unable to impregnate her. He sends for a friend of hers to come live with them to keep her company while he focuses on his poetry career. This chapter is the first to leave WWI behind and explore post-war Europe.
A childless woman tries to rescue a cat in the hotel in which she’s staying, in “Cat in the Rain.” She fails, but the hotel manager delivers a calico cat instead. In “Out of Season,” a husband and wife hire the town drunk to be their guide on a fishing trip and in doing so become the laugh of the town. The wife is so embarrassed that she stays in the hotel rather than go fishing.
“Cross-Country Snow” returns to Nick, finding him and his friend on a ski trip, during which they discuss their future plans. Nick is married with a child at home, and his friend considers returning to the United States to study.
In “My Old Man,” a young boy watches as his jockey father races horses. Their lives become complicated when his father does something illicit and they must move. When his father dies in a horse-riding accident, his fellow jockeys believe he got what he deserved.
In ‘Big Two-Hearted River: Part 1,” Nick goes on a solo fishing trip in Northern Michigan after the war. A forest fire has devastated the land, reminding him of the battlefields he saw during WWI. In ‘Big Two-Hearted River: Part 2,” Nick narrates the mundane details of his camping trip and fishing methods.
In one last memoir, “L’Envoi,” a narrator and his wife, both restricted to the palace grounds, are visited by the King of Greece.
The short stories and memoirs in In Our Time explore themes of loss, death, grief, separation, and alienation either attached to WWI or periphery events. There is often juxtaposition between life and death, as in the story “Indian Camp.” The sparse language and ambiguous emotions of the narrators, so emblematic of Hemingway’s writing style, are on full display in these stories. Nick Adams is Hemingway’s semi-autobiographical character, reflecting Hemingway’s own experiences and observations, and acting as a way for Hemingway to express his true feelings about life, especially about his experiences during WWI.
The short stories are organized in relative chronological order, weaving together in such a way that they tell one larger story. Most are about Nick Adams and begin with a memoir that leads to a story. The first story, “On the Quai in Smyrna,” is placed before Chapter 1 to set the tone for the whole narrative. It follows the evacuation of Greek troops after a defeat by the Turkish army from the point of view of an American officer aboard a ship.
In the Chapter 1 story “Indian Camp,” Nick Adams and his doctor father interrupt their vacation to attend to an Indian woman who is about to give birth. His father successfully performs a cesarean section only to find out the father of the baby has committed suicide.
In “The Doctor and the Doctors Wife,” Nick’s father hires an Indian man to saw logs that have rolled onto his land. The man refers to the logs as “stolen property,” which leads to an argument between the two men. Nick is only a boy and discovers himself choosing sides in the argument. The stories in Chapters 3 and 4 follow the breakup between teenager Nick and his girlfriend.
“The Battler” finds Nick hitchhiking via train when the brakeman discovers him and kicks him off the train. In ‘A Very Short Story,’ Nick is wounded in battle and recounts a love affair with his wartime nurse.
“Soldier’s Home” veers away from Nick, instead, focusing on a returned soldier Krebs, who does nothing but practice the clarinet and play pool. One day, he decides to move to Kansas City to find a job. In “The Revolutionist,” a Hungarian communist en route to Switzerland is arrested in Italy.
In “Mr. and Mrs. Eliot,” Hubert Eliot is a stuffy postgraduate poet who saves himself for the woman he will marry until, at twenty-five, he marries a woman much like himself in temperament. They move to France, where he is unable to impregnate her. He sends for a friend of hers to come live with them to keep her company while he focuses on his poetry career. This chapter is the first to leave WWI behind and explore post-war Europe.
A childless woman tries to rescue a cat in the hotel in which she’s staying, in “Cat in the Rain.” She fails, but the hotel manager delivers a calico cat instead. In “Out of Season,” a husband and wife hire the town drunk to be their guide on a fishing trip and in doing so become the laugh of the town. The wife is so embarrassed that she stays in the hotel rather than go fishing.
“Cross-Country Snow” returns to Nick, finding him and his friend on a ski trip, during which they discuss their future plans. Nick is married with a child at home, and his friend considers returning to the United States to study.
In “My Old Man,” a young boy watches as his jockey father races horses. Their lives become complicated when his father does something illicit and they must move. When his father dies in a horse-riding accident, his fellow jockeys believe he got what he deserved.
In ‘Big Two-Hearted River: Part 1,” Nick goes on a solo fishing trip in Northern Michigan after the war. A forest fire has devastated the land, reminding him of the battlefields he saw during WWI. In ‘Big Two-Hearted River: Part 2,” Nick narrates the mundane details of his camping trip and fishing methods.
In one last memoir, “L’Envoi,” a narrator and his wife, both restricted to the palace grounds, are visited by the King of Greece.
The short stories and memoirs in In Our Time explore themes of loss, death, grief, separation, and alienation either attached to WWI or periphery events. There is often juxtaposition between life and death, as in the story “Indian Camp.” The sparse language and ambiguous emotions of the narrators, so emblematic of Hemingway’s writing style, are on full display in these stories. Nick Adams is Hemingway’s semi-autobiographical character, reflecting Hemingway’s own experiences and observations, and acting as a way for Hemingway to express his true feelings about life, especially about his experiences during WWI.
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