Hills Like White Elephants
analyze literary works week's readings, completing: Explain literary work captured interest, terms concepts text support explanation. Describe analytical approaches outlined Chapter 16, details text support interpretations.

"Hills Like White Elephants:" Using dialogue to advance a story

Ernest Hemingway's short story "Hills Like White Elephants" is a spare, poetical tale told almost entirely in dialogue. The plot of the story is simple -- a man and a girl are traveling through Spain. They are both lovers. The girl is pregnant and the man is pressuring her to have an abortion. By the end of the story, the reader is certain that the girl will get the abortion but the relationship is permanently soured. This is revealed gradually, over the course of the couple's rather elliptical dialogue. By stressing the dialogue between the two characters and keeping description at a minimum, Hemingway is able to bring the lack of communication between…...

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References

Hemingway, Ernest. Hills Like White Elephants. Retrieved:

 http://www.has.vcu.edu/eng/webtext/hills/hills.htm 

L'Heureux, J. (2011). Talk that walks -- how Hemingway's dialogue powers a story. Wall Street

Lamb, Robert Paul. (1996). Hemingway and the creation of twentieth-century dialogue,

Hills like hite Elephants -- Critical Literary Analysis
One of the first things entering the mind of a reader (on an obvious level) in Hemingway's short story is that the image of a white elephant the woman sees in the line of hills in the distance has created a classic man-woman conundrum. She sees it her way and he sees it his. The beer and the anis del Toro -- and the expectant train -- are just pieces on the chessboard, merely part of the setting that perhaps will play a role in this very short story.

Like his other short stories, this brilliant piece of fiction by Hemingway is very tightly written but it packs symbolism, irony and characterization into a short amount of space. In this story, the ultimate meaning is that the man does not wish to take responsibility for the woman's pregnancy and on the other hand she…...

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Works Cited

Hemingway, Ernest. The Complete Short Stories of Ernest Hemingway: The Finca Vigia

Edition. New York: Simon and Schuster. 1998.

Link, Alex. "Staking everything on it: a stylistic analysis of linguistic patterns in 'Hills like

White Elephants'." The Hemingway Review, 23.2 (2004): 1-5.

Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway
In Hemingway's story there are a number of contrasts between the two people. First of all, there are the obvious contrasts -- he's a man, she's a woman. He speaks Spanish, she doesn't. (When the woman tells them, "The train comes in five minutes," Jig's response is "What did she say?")

But the larger contrasts deal with the attitudes of the American and Jig. The American tries to convince Jig that "the operation" is no big deal. ("It's really an awfully simple operation, Jig," the man said. "It's not really an operation at all.") She seems unconvinced and doesn't really want to go through with it, although much of her concern appears to have to do more with how the man will act toward her "afterward" than how she feels about the operation itself.

These two people have a real communication problem. The girl keeps looking…...

Hills Like hite Elephants": Critical Analysis
Ernest Hemingway's "Hills like hite Elephants" is an intriguing story of two individuals who have come to a difficult conversation. Hemingway captures this conversation between man and woman about a pending abortion but never actually revealing what they are talking about, only subtly alluding to the issue throughout the conversation. The context for the conversation is at a bar in a rather desolate place in a station where individuals simply pass through. The setting sets up the context of how the story is reflective of the dialogue of between the man and the woman- it seems like a pass through conversation and it is a conversation that needs to happen to reach the final destination. The man tells Jig that it is a "real simple operation" and that it is just to "let the air in" and that it's "all natural" (Hemingway). These words along…...

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Works Cited

Adair, William. "Ernest Hemingway and the Poetics of Loss." College Literature. 10.3 (1983): 294-306. Web. 27 Nov. 2011. .

Hemingway, Ernest. "Hills like White Elephants." http://www.gummyprint.com/blog/archives/hills-like-white-elephants-complete-story/.

Wagner, Linda."Proud and Friendly and Gently: Women in Hemingway's Early Fiction." College Literature. 7.3 (1980): 239-247. Web. 27 Nov. 2011. .

A white elephant, afte all, is a false vesion of something eal -- an antique that is wothless is often called a white elephant. When the man and the gil ae sitting, tying a new dink togethe, the gil says that the hills in the distance look like white elephants. Howeve, he language seems to elide the eal with the false: "I just meant the coloing of thei skin though the tees," she says, of the hills, efeing to the hills as if they wee alive. Within the famewok of the stoy, the confusion of the eal with the false o with the metapho could efe to he confusion as to whethe she is pegnant with something that is 'alive' o whethe the elationship is 'alive.' Similaly, Gallimad confuses the tappings of femininity with being female itself, and the tappings of anothe cultue with the eal essence of the…...

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references to the Spanish word for beer, for example, and various foreign drinks like absinthe create an aura of the exotic that seems to act as a barrier to creating a real relationship between the man and the girl. When one is a foreigner, either a perpetual traveler like the man, or a permanent foreign resident like Gallimard, one is always a trespasser, learning things through a translation, rather than truly apprehending the culture directly. As a traveler, one cannot even really understand a person from one's own culture, in the case of the man, in a stable, fixed, and permanent fashion, because of the inability to form a true commitment while constantly moving.

Hills like White Elephants is one of the most discussed works of Ernest Hemingway primarily due to excessive use of symbolism in the story to depict conflict of interest of a young couple on the subject of abortion. Interestingly the word pregnancy or abortion is never used in the story but a reader still gets the message through variety of symbols. These symbols and theme augment the iceberg technique used by Hemingway to illustrate his message without actually using the exact words. In the story, the theme and symbol of white hills play an important role as it lends support to other symbols as well.
White elephants refer to the pregnancy and the unborn child. When the American says he has never seen a white elephant, he is possibly referring to the child who hasn't yet arrived. "The girl was looking off at the line of hills. They were white in…...

Hills Like White Elephants
Ernest Hemingway's "Hills like White Elephants"

Ernest Hemingway's "Hills like White Elephants"

Ernest Hemingway's short story, "Hills like White Elephants" draws largely on the themes of selfishness and naivety, which can be seen in looking at the story's main characters. In order to further embed these themes into his writing, Hemingway skillfully utilizes the literary tools of setting and symbolism to not only give readers an understanding of the situation at hand, but an allowance to place themselves into the characters' shoes.

The story centers upon a young couple traveling throughout Europe. Whether the couple is married or engaged is left unsaid, and it becomes uncertain whether or not the couple has really known each other very long at all. The woman, Jig, and the American man she is with begin the story with small-talk on a train that evidently leads into a much larger discussion. It becomes increasingly apparent…...

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References

Hashmi, N. (2003). Hills like white elephants: the jilting of Jig. The Hemingway Review,

23(1): pp. 72. Web. Retrieved from: ProQuest Database.

Hemingway, E. (1998) Hills like white elephants. The complete short stories of Ernest

Hemingway. Print. New York, NY: Simon and Schuster, Inc.

Goodman Brown is clearly a pious and spiritual man and evil creates great conflict in him. Hemingway's characters are not spiritual, that is clear from their dialogue and from the fact that they are considering "the operation." Both sets of characters are facing moral dilemmas that will affect them now and later, and they both handle those very differently, and that is another element that sets these two stories apart. The writers were different, they wrote in different eras, and their stories reflect these changes in time and place. Their similarities are there, but so are their differences, and these differences are just as important to both stories' success as their similarities are.
While the outcome of the two stories is ultimately the same, the characters are certainly different people, the setting is different, and they react differently to their difficulties. The Hemingway characters seem almost resigned to their fate,…...

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References

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. "Young Goodman Brown." Online-Literature.com. 2005. 9 July 2005.  http://www.online-literature.com/hawthorne/158/ 

Hemingway, Ernest. "Hills Like White Elephants." Purdue University. 2005. 9 July 2005.  http://web.ics.purdue.edu/~conreys/101files/Otherfolders/Hillslikewhitepg.html

Hills Like hite Elephants" -- Ernest Hemingway
ill the couple agree to an abortion?

Jig, the girlfriend, knows she is going to have to give in to the man and have the abortion, and there are hints and there is foreshadowing (albeit very subtle) that provide the clues. This paper reviews the subtleties and on pages 2 and 3 points to specific passages that suggest she will in fact give in to him and abort the baby.

Subtle Hints in the Narrative

The reader knows from a careful study of the short story that these two have traveled together and are very familiar with each other's positions on the issue at hand. It is obvious from the start that there is tension between the two, and the fact that a train is on its way adds to the heightened tension. Hemingway is well-known for his brilliant use of allegory, metaphor and imagery. Could…...

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Works Cited

Hemingway, Ernest. "Hills Like White Elephants." Men Without Women. New York: Simon

and Schuster, 2002.

post: Hills Like White Elephants
Ernest Hemingway's short story "Hills Like White Elephants" revolves around the dialogue of a young woman and a man, obviously lovers, who are discussing the woman's pending abortion. The woman does not want to have an abortion; the man wants her to do so. She sees his not-so-subtle lack of enthusiasm about her pregnancy as an example of how he does not care about her. Although he claims to have feelings for the girl, the man clearly wants to be free and unfettered and feels a baby will tie him down.

A white elephant is a term often applied to something that is false. The girl sees the hills in the distance and says they are like white elephants, but her simile becomes confused as she says it is if they have 'skins' like real elephants. To the girl, her unborn child is real; to the…...

male figure in Hills Like hite Elephants is inferior to Jig, the female counterpart within the story, yet Jig's realization of her strengths against the male is her power to refuse having the abortion surgery. Of course, the story is never resolved and many critical analysts of Hemingway's story have sought to make a prediction about what decision Jig will ultimately make in the face of such a selfish and immature man; Rankin is no different. The orientation of his article is mostly analyzing the dialogue between the man and Jig, paying special attention to her responses and reactions rather than his. In this way, Jig is always the most important person within the story due to the fact that she is the one who is debating whether or not to have the operation. Rankin takes the position that Jig is stronger than the acts, but these displays of…...

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Works Cited

Hemingway, Ernest. The Complete Short Stories Of Ernest Hemingway. Finca Vigia. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster Inc., 1987. 211-214. Print.

Rankin, Paul. "Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants." The Explicator 63.4 (2005): 234+. Literature Resource Center. Web. 17 May 2011. 018186&v=2.1&u=mission_main&it=r&p=LitRC&sw=whttp://0go.galegroup.com.library.wvmccd.cc.ca.us/ps/i.do?&id=GALE%7CA137

Ernest Hemingway's - Hills Like hite Elephants, write essay supports
Final Act

It is quite possible that Ernest Hemingway was being deliberately deceptive when he wrote "Hills Like hite Elephants," which first appeared in 1927 in the collection of short stories entitled Men ithout omen. Regardless of his intention, when the story is read outside of the social and cultural context in which it was written -- as is the case when a contemporary reader peruses this manuscript -- the text has a certain aura of duplicity in which undiscerning readers may be lulled into misinterpreting its meaning: or possibly even thinking that there is no meaning. Close analysis of literary criticism, as well as an examination of biographical information in Hemingway's life, however, informs readers that there is a crucial debate occurring between the two main characters regarding whether or not a young woman, named Jig, will have an abortion…...

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Works Cited

Altman, Christine. "A Junction In Life." VCCS Litonline. 2003. Web. http://vccslitonline.cc.va.us/copy_of_hills/junction.htm

This source provides a comprehensive summary of Hemingway's short story. It also emphasizes an interpretation in which the setting of the story (the train stop) provides the most insight into the future lives of the characters.

Anderson, Jefferson. "Ernest Hemingway's Hills Like White Elephants": icerbergs, raisin bread, and the short story. Neither Red Nor Blue. 2009. Web.  http://jeffersonflanders.wordpress.com/2009/10/29/ernest-hemingways-hills-like-white-elephants-icebergs-raisin-bread-and-the-short-story/ 

This is a fairly insightful article regarding Hemingway's short story. It contains a good deal of history regarding the social context which Hemingway wrote in. This article also elucidates Hemingway's "Iceberg Theory," which is featured in "Hills Like White Elephants."

Commonplace Log Part 1
“You know in the old days it was not so easy to get a girl when you wanted to be married.” This quote begins the story of “High Horse’s Courting,” and it sets the tone that Black Elk wants to set. He is making a comment on the present and the past with the quote and wants to show that times were different when he was a young man and that the courting process was a lot more challenging back in the old days. It thus appears that he is talking to a younger audience and is both trying to entertain them a bit and trying to teach them a lesson—namely that if young men want to win a nice young girl they should be prepared to show that they are men. So that story that he is about to tell is one such a story, and I…...

Don’t Want Any Tension The theme of Hills Like White Elephants revolves around the tension between the two main characters, the American and the girl, Jig. The author uses a number of different literary elements to reinforce this theme. Each of those elements underscores points of distinction and opposition. In that way, those elements reinforce the opposition between the American and the girl, which is one of the reasons why tension is the dominant theme of this tale.
The setting is one of the main ways literary elements that emphasize the opposition between the American and Jig to create tension in Hills Like White Elephants. The story is set in a train station, which is significant because it is manmade as opposed to a creation of nature. The characters are in a barren setting, described by the author as a place of “no shade and no trees…between two lines of rails in…...

Moreover, the girl changes the subject quickly to having another beer.
While the man in the story remains utterly insensitive to his girlfriend, her state of mind is less clear. On the one hand, her self-esteem seems dreadfully low. She repeats, "I don't care about me," and she asks the man if getting the operation will make him happy. When she states, "I don't care about me," she could also mean "I care about you more," but she never says that." She utters the finishing lines of the story: "I feel fine...There's nothing wrong with me. I feel fine." Her words most likely indicate her further suppression of her anger and true feelings. However, the girl might also have come to a decision about ending their relationship. It is entirely possible that her hill-gazing has inspired her to make major changes in her life. After all, the open-ended story does…...

Ernest Hemingway’s short story “Hills Like White Elephants” is, in many ways, a traditional Hemingway tale.  What we mean by that is that the story could be read in a somewhat misogynistic manner and one of the protagonists is some version of the great white hunter that plays such a recurring role in Hemingway’s stories. 

To determine a thesis for the essay, it is important to understand the short story.  First, the story is short.  In fact, it is only four pages long.  Second, the interactions in the story only cover a very short....

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