Hemingway's Female Consciousness Perceived Through His Three Novels

Ernest Hemingway was a major American writer in the 20th century. This is a study of Ernest Hemingway with a focus on the development of his female consciousness. By re-examining his time and personal experiences, and applying some feminist theories into the analysis of the heroines in his three main novels, the study has found there was a distinctive female consciousness in Hemingway, which was developed over three stages as represented in three of his novels.During Hemingway's time, feminist movement grew up and developed rapidly, social gender roles began to change. And in World War I, his love with the nurse Agnes was engraved on his bones and heart. In the Sun Also Rises, he created a typical rebellious new woman Brett Ashley. Hemingway showed his admiration to new woman, acknowledged some basic rights of women, and his vague female consciousness was sprouted at the same time. Affected by the accumulation and influence of patriarchy culture, the rights he had advocated was limited and confined by men. Paying attention to women's living condition, understanding women's feelings, thinking about women's values standards, Hemingway's female consciousness became stronger and stronger. The heroine Catherine Barkley in A Farewell to Arms was stronger than the hero Frederic Henry at any aspect and she taught Henry a lot. Here, he tried to make an imagination of ideal woman in his heart, who kept all the"cardinal virtue"of traditional women, and possessed courage and abilities which were admired by men. But Hemingway didn't assure how to let the woman superior to man live together with him. He attempted to protect men's dignity and dominant position, and he could not cross the last line of patriarchal consciousness. So he had to arrange the death of Catherine as the end of the novel, Hemingway's female consciousness was indefinite in this stage. Experiencing two World Wars, taking part in the anti-Fascist war, witnessing the transition of the society, encountering his last wife in Spain, Hemingway finished For Whom the Bell Tolls after ten years. In this novel, Hemingway entirely surpassed his own limited parochial masculine viewpoint, and found the best way to solve all the problems. The heroine Maria turned to be the most ideal and perfect woman of Hemingway. She not only possessed the same virtues and abilities as Catherine had, but also inherited Pilar's combined power of both sexes under her guidance. Loving and connecting with Jordan inseparably, Maria developed this kind of power and made it balanced, which turned gender equality into reality in the end. Hemingway's female consciousness had turned to be definite and mature then.