How Does Ernest Hemingway Use Rain In A Farewell To Arms

401 Words2 Pages
Rain in Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms is a constant symbol of impending calamity. It serves as a forewarning of bad things to come, from physical pain to emotional struggles and even death. Rain also sets the somber mood of the novel, reflecting the direction the war is going and the feeling that people have about it. Ultimately, rain connects all of the many tragedies in the book and iterates the message of the devastating affects of war and the death and suffering that goes hand-in-hand with it. From the very beginning of the novel, we are told of a “permanent rain” (4). Looking back, we see that this “permanent rain” is death and the looming threat that exists throughout the entire novel. Hemingway uses rain to foreshadow the