A Farewell to Arms

1 Pages 244 Words

Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms
In Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms Fredrick Henry’s lust eventually turns to love for Catherine Barkley.
Fredrick Henry is an American who is studying architecture in Rome when WWI starts. He joins the Italian army and becomes an officer in charge of overseeing the ambulances in a small town a few miles from the front. He likes to drink rather heavily with the other officers and goes with them to the local bordello. Him and his friend Rinaldi often talk about girls and the women of the bordello. “Here now we have beautiful girls. New girls never been to the front before” (11). Henry is happy with his flings and does not think much about them except that they are fun.
Rinaldi meets two new women, two English nurses at the hospital and have just arrived to the town. Rinaldi takes Henry to meet the two nurses. Henry then meets Catherine Barkley and at first is only interested in her physically like he is with the other girls. When he goes the next couple of afternoons to see her he acts like he is playing a game. One visit he tries to kiss her and gets slapped for it but this only worked to his advantage. “I was angry and yet certain, seeing it all ahead like the moves in a chess game” (26). He plays it off and is able to finally get a kiss from her....