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Relationships In Ernest Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants

853 Words4 Pages

Relationships are the core of everything we do in life. We love someone, so we do something for them; we value someone 's opinion, so we respect them; we dislike someone, so we avoid them. Relationships cause people to act on their emotions which impact how and why they do the things they do. Ernest Hemingway’s short story “Hills Like White Elephants” is about a couple trying to come to a conclusion on a delicate matter. While the man strongly promotes his opinion the girl is hesitant but wants to do whatever will make him happy. The struggles presented between these two characters bring to light issues in human relationships that weigh into everyday life. Hemingway’s short story reveals to readers how relationships affect communication, decision …show more content…

The man is manipulating her through his words to get his girl to go through with the operation. First, he brings up the operation and goes on to say that “It’s really an awfully simple operation”(42) hinting at the fact that it is easily done and not a big deal at all. Secondly, the man uses the idea of happiness to win her over in this decision, “That’s the only thing that bothers us. It’s the only thing that’s made us unhappy”(50) he is manipulating her into thinking that this operation will revive their happiness they once shared in this relationship. Thirdly, he tries to normalize the operation to make her feel like it’s a common thing, no big deal, he tells her she doesn’t “have to be afraid. [he’s] known lots of people that have it done”(53). After all of these comments he made to convince her of his decision he tries to play it off like he wants her to do whatever she feels is right. The final key to manipulation: make it seem like it was her decision when in reality he manipulated her into making this choice all along. Manipulation is unfortunately a common theme in relationships and this short story does an incredible job by shining light on that issue in human relationships. Ultimately, relationships affect our everyday lives in every way possible. Whether the decision you’re making is big or small your relationship will weigh into your choice in some way. Not all relationships

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Relationships are everywhere, but examining specific relationship sometimes present a tricky mine field to wander through. In the short story “The Caveman in the Hedges”, by Stacey Richter is about a complicated relationship between the narrator and his girlfriend Kim, who desire different things in life. The narrator wants to have his punk rocker life back with his girlfriend Kim when they used to be careless and immature, but his girlfriend Kim wanted to form a family and get married with the narrator. So this caused greater conflict further on in the story because Kim started to act like the caveman's to the point where the narrator thought Kim was having and affair in the basement. Then the narrator changed his actions and behavior in how

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Relationships In Ernest Hemingway's The Hills Like White Elephants

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Internal Pressures of Relationships It is human nature to show our emotions in the presence of our significant other. We seek them for support and devotion, as well as trust and loyalty. The problems that couples endure are ones that they should endure together and not without one another. In Ernest Hemingway’s story, “The Hills Like White Elephants,” the author shows us that there can be many internal conflicts with our closest companions that arise throughout the course of time while reading his story.

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Hills Like White Elephants Literary Analysis

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Throughout the short story (1), “Hills Like White Elephants,” Ernest Hemingway is speaking about a seemingly unwanted pregnancy and a woman’s uneasiness with going through an abortion. However, Hemingway never explicitly says in this work of fiction (2) that it is about abortion or that the woman, Jig, is uncomfortable with it, but uses symbolism (3) to present this to the audience. At the time “Hills like White Elephants” was published, in 1927, abortion was illegal in most places and a very taboo subject that wasn’t to be openly discussed in public. Thus, Hemingway relied greatly upon the use of symbolism to get his message across for this reason as well as the third person narrator (4) that did not give insight into the character’s thoughts within this piece of literature (5) . He uses symbols such as the train station, white hills, the baggage, and the drinks to point towards the underlying internal conflict (6) of Jig’s decision that is being heavily influenced by the American man, who wants Jig to get the abortion.

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Short Happy Life Of Francis Macomber By Ernest Hemingway

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The Dialogue In Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants

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The dialogue in Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants” reveals a man’s and a woman’s incongruent conflict on abortion, and the author’s fundamentally feminist position is visible in the portrayal of the woman’s independent choice of whether or not to keep the baby she is carrying. The plot is very simple in the story which is less than 1500 words long. A woman and a man spend less than an hour on a hot summers day at a Spanish train station in the valley of Ebro as they are waiting for a train heading for Madrid. Their dialogue takes up most of the space and only few major actions take place.

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The author’s intent in “Hills Like White Elephants” is to show what happens when people don’t communicate and aren’t honest about their feelings. In this story the two main character are clearly trying to avoid talking about something, and they do so by drinking. The man, who is given no name, but is called the American, is trying to act indifferent about the situation at hand. He claims he wants to the girl to do what she wants, but is clearly oversimplifying the matter. The girl seems very indecisive about what to do, and can’t seem to make any decisions, including what to drink, without first consulting the American.

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Popular Mechanics Raymond Carver

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The man acts like he would be fine with having the baby but it is obvious he doesn’t want it at all saying “I wouldn’t have you do it if you didn’t want to. But I know it’s perfectly simple” (Hemingway 925). She likes the idea of having a baby throughout the story and the man realizes she wants to have it. At the end of the story he walks through the bar and has a drink by himself and “look[s] at the people” to get used to being in a bar by himself again (Hemingway 926). He is planning to break up with her because she wants to have the baby and he wants to live his life the way he has been.

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Hills Like White Elephants Literary Criticism

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Hills Like White Elephant is a short story by Earnest Hemingway from 1927. The story is talking about a failing relationship between an American man and his girlfriend. This couple is at a critical point on their lives. At the bar in a train station in Spain, the girl, Jig, does not want to end up her pregnancy, but she is going to sacrifice the baby to satisfied him. Because he is critical of the exploitation of his girl’s feelings concerning the continuation of unbalanced relationship.

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Hills Like White Elephants Feminist Analysis Essay

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Hemingway’s unique and unbiased point of view excludes the important detail of tone inflection, and readers will never know for sure what Hemingway intended the outcome to be. But in the past eighty-three years, people seem to almost unanimously agree that the man exhibits dominance in the relationship. However, evidence from Jig’s dynamic character and her body language strongly suggest that it is time to reevaluate the story and open up the possibility that Jig has been underestimated these past years, and more importantly, that it is she who wins this

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The Role Of Abortion In Ernest Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants

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Ernest Hemingway, graced the 1920 's with a shocking story about abortion in "Hills like White Elephants". At the time this work was not very well received by publishers and readers alike, although Hemingway only gives the reader the very basic description of his characters, and by only saying "the man" or "the girl", he leaves you having to fill in the blanks. The reader is able to deduce from the story, that the "girl" is somewhat less mature than the "man", by the content of the questions that she asked, and it appears she only wants to please the "man", by therefore putting the male character 's feelings above her own feelings. This is usually a sign of immaturity. The "girl" apparently has less life experience.

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In every story, characters experience challenges which change the outcome of a story. The plot of a story is determined by what decisions are made with each character and most of the time decisions are based on what is best for a relationship. There are different representations of marital relationships in the short stories of “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant, and “The Chrysanthemums” by John Steinbeck. The characters are influenced by their partner 's decisions in each of these stories. This topic will be discussed and explained to give more insight on how the characters were affected based on their circumstances.

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You see, selfishness is the reason behind the misery of others. When it comes to humans, we do not always think that the price of our selfishness can cause the people around us into misery. We humans like to put ourselves first, and plenty of us do not think about the consequences of putting ourselves first. In “Hills Like White Elephants” the price of the couple selfishness comes with consequences losing a life they created together. This young couple is not ready to give up their freedom, or their relationship, if you looked from the woman’s point of view.

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