A Farewell To Arms Henry's Desertion

Desertion of Arms:A Farewell to Arms Desertion Discussion
A Farewell to Arms is a novel written by Ernest Hemingway which tells the story of Frederic Henry, an American ambulance driver in the Italian army and Catherine Barkley, an English nurse that is at the war front. Throughout the novel, Hemingway hints at Henry’s desire to leave the war, his eventual desertion. The prominent events that lead to his personal farewell to arms were Catherine’s pregnancy, the way the public and the soldiers themselves treated the war, and the Italians inability to handle a war retreat.
The most prominent event of all to give Henry the desire to leave the war would be Catherine announcing her pregnancy to him. This would leave Henry with an unwarranted desire to leave to be with Catherine. This statement is proven by Henry’s reaction after Catherine says “ I’m going

Instead of being a calm and collected retreat it was more of a widespread panic, that would make Henry think the war was coming to a close. This is proven by the army’s irrational way of handling deserters, in an attempt to show the other soldiers it was not worth it to desert the army. This method was to question any soldiers that were not with their unit lightly and kill them if they seemed like deserters. This is proven by the way the military police treat an officer that was lightly questioned and then ordered to be shot. “Abandoned his troops, ordered to be shot,” (224). This would make Henry decide it was not worth it to stay with the war and made him make up his mind to leave sa he jumps off a bridge to seal the deal on his personal farewell to arms.
In conclusion, Henry thinks alot about whether the war is worth staying over or whether he should leave when he gets the chance. Either way many things influenced Henry’s decision but these were the most prominent events that had the most direct influence on