Hills Like White Elephants, By Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway’s style of writing is minimalistic. One story in particular, “Hills Like White Elephants”, shows this type of writing. Hemingway’s stories make the reader follow along by not labeling the dialog of the characters. His stories are often short and require the reader to determine the motivations of the characters. These characteristics are what define Hemingway’s writing style as minimalistic.
In all of Hemingway’s stories, he uses little to no dialog labeling. The reader is expected to and must, in order to follow along with what is going on, pay close attention to the story and what each character may be saying, “‘Four reales.’ ‘We want two Anis del Toro.’ ‘With water?’ ‘Do you want it with water?’ ‘I don’t know…’”(Hemingway

The narrator does not give the reader a look into the mind of the character. As the reader, you are expected to determine the motivations of the characters. This is another key part of the author’s writing style. In “Hills Like White Elephants” the man, a character from the story, seems to want his female companion to have an abortion. The character’s motivation is not clear though, “‘Well,’ the man said, ‘if you don’t want to you don’t have to. I wouldn’t have you do it if you didn’t want to. But I know it’s perfectly simple.’”(Hemingway 173) In this quote from the story one of the characters, the man, talks to the girl about an abortion operation. Hemingway’s writing style does not directly tell us of the characters’ motivations. The reader must infer what the character wants by what they say and do. From this quote it could be said that the man wants the girl to decide what to do, but it could also be said that the man wants her to go through with the operation. His motivation, the male character’s, is slowly pieced together while following along and paying attention to the story, ‘“Of course it does. But I don’t want anybody but you. I don’t want anyone else. And I know it’s perfectly simple.”’(Hemingway 174) This quote helps clear up the character’s motivation but it isn’t exactly stated. The motivation of the character is unclear and can be debated, this is another key in Hemingway’s minimalistic