Hemingway If literary genius can be described as one person's ability to influence the thinking of others and to do it only with written words, then Ernest Miller Hemingway was certainly deserving of the title. With his direct, declarative and streamlined style of writing, a style he first learned while writing as a newspaper journalist, Hemingway observed the world around him and the people in it, and then wrote of his observations on the nature of mankind.

Born on July 21, 1899 in the family home at Oak Park Illinois, Hemingway was the second of six children for his parents. His father, Dr. Clarence Hemingway, was a family physician, and his mother, Grace Hall Hemingway a music teacher. As a boy he was taught by his father how to hunt and fish, and it was in his childhood that he developed a passion for exploring nature that would not only endure throughout his life, but would also drive him restlessly to seek adventures in the wild. In seeking his adventures, as well as observing the ongoing battles between man and beast, man and element, man and self, Hemingway then wrote about all that he sought and saw (CNN "Hemingway," 2000).

After graduating from high school in 1917, Hemingway went to work for the Kansas City Star, and it was there that he learned a particular writing style that he would utilize for most of his life's work in literature. The Star's stylebook instructed their reporters to, "Use short sentences. Use short first paragraphs. Use vigorous English, not forgetting to strive for smoothness. Be positive, not negative." The emphasis was on clear writing, and Hemingway displayed a typical Hemingway-passion for those rules. Only rarely did he break away from...

"Those were the best rules I ever learned for the business of writing," he stated. "I've never forgotten them. No man with any talent, who feels and writes truly about the thing he is trying to say, can fail to write well if he abides with them. On the Star you were forced to learn to write a simple declarative sentence. That's useful to anyone" (Desnoyers. Para.12).
After Hemingway turned eighteen he tried to enlist in the army, but was deferred because of vision problems with his left eye, but when he learned that the Red Cross was taking volunteers as ambulance drivers he quickly signed up. He was accepted in December of 1917, left his job at the paper in April of 1918, and sailed for Europe in May. On July 8, 1918, only a few weeks after arriving, and while distributing cigarettes and chocolates to Italian soldiers in the trenches, Hemingway was seriously wounded by over 200 pieces of shrapnel from an Austrian mortar shell that landed just a few feet away. The explosion knocked Hemingway momentarily unconscious, killed an Italian soldier and blew the legs off another.

He was awarded the Italian Silver Medal for Valor with the official Italian citation reading: "Gravely wounded by numerous pieces of shrapnel from an enemy shell, with an admirable spirit of brotherhood, before taking care of himself, he rendered generous assistance to the Italian soldiers more seriously wounded by the same explosion and did not allow himself to be carried elsewhere until after they had been evacuated" (Lost Generation, para. 2).

After the war he became acquainted with writer Sherwood Anderson who advised Hemingway that if he was serious about becoming a novelist, he should move to Paris and live among the expatriate writers there. Although an inherent talent for writing belonged solely to Hemingway and was apparent even during his childhood, while living in Paris, his writing style matured into something memorable and great, perhaps due to the guidance or influence of other writers also living in Paris at that time. The names of those within his circle of friends, allies and mentors included Gertrude Stein, Ford Madox Ford, Ezra Pound, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and James Joyce (CNN para. 28), making Hemingway's apprenticeship - like nearly all…