Masculinity In The Battler

When interpreting the short story ‘The Battler’ by Ernest Hemingway it is important to note that it was written in the 1920’s by a man deeply concerned with what made the “ideal man”. This essay will argue that the Battler is largely a story about masculinity and the danger of women corrupting this frail façade. From a feminist perspective I will analyse the portrayal of Ad’s wife and how this impacted about the patriarchal context of gender roles that Hemingway is concerned with in this piece.

Feminism is a movement concerned with encouraging equality between genders. This is done through the abolition of gender roles and the empowerment of women in a society that is run by the patriachy (control by men). The Battler is a story about Nick

Nick exemplifies these qualities from his experiences within the text. At the beginning of the text we are introduced to him having been beaten yet he gets up and continues on his journey. From this encounter Nick has a black eye and scraped hands and knees and is generally looking worse for wear. Nick is bitter about this loss of the fight and is wanting to seek out a fight with this brakeman who has thrown him off the freight train vowing that “He would get him someday”. Nick in this instance shows the crude masculinity of revenge in the face of weakness. Nick comments that “They would never suck him in that way again.” Which corresponds with the ‘code hero’ contempt for all weakness that a perfect masculine character should have. However, the maculinity at the start of the text is unrestrained and angry. This idea of masculinity is developed throughout the text to be a more inward and controlled ideal after his interactions with Ad

These characteristics which are typically seen as being feminine are expressed in this male almost at the contrast of Ad Francis who is the height of overt masculinity in his expressions of violence. However, Bugs is seen to be a lesser man in this text rather than an exemplary figure. Throughout the text Bugs is referred to as “nigger” which shows the detachment from the other characters in reducing Bugs down to a servant figure of an inferior status to the other two characters. Therefore, Nick is shown to not value Bugs and his characteristics and is not shown to be of much as an influence to his character as Ad Francis is. In fact, Nick is repelled by the two characters’ emotional attachments both to each other and Ad to his wife. At the end of the text, Nick reflects that Ad’s “mutilated face looked childish in repose.”. This quote shows how Nick begins to see Ad as emasculated and infantile largely because of this care from Bugs and secondly from his reliance upon and emotional damage caused by his ex wife.

Through a feminist analysis, the one female character in Hemingway’s short story is Ad Francis’ wife. She is a strong female character who was able to leave a relationship that wasn’t healthy for her (particularly significant considering the time period of the 1920’s where divorces/separations of married couples were uncommon) and is the sole supporter