*Initial response: After reading, “Soldiers Home" by Hemingway I could not help but feel empathy for Krebs. He comes back home to Kansas after spending a couple years in war, to find that things are different. When Krebs went to war, it was straight out of college so when he comes back a different person he realizes that the town and the people are different in his eyes. Krebs went to war a teenager and came out a man. In the story it shows how Krebs is having a hard time adjusting to how life is supposed to go on now that he is back home. The literary element that sticks out to me the most is the setting. Hemingway writes this story so good that it seems as if I was Krebs experiencing what was taking place in front of me. As I was reading the story I felt for Krebs because I could see how he comes back home a different man and has to pick up where he left off and is lost. He had to grow up quickly when he joined the marines however back home is a different lifestyle. He doesn’t seem to have any fight left in him because the story goes on to say that Krebs avoids confrontation. He also doesn’t seem to have any drive left in him either and it shows when Krebs gets up every morning sits on his porch then goes to play pool. It seems as if he is going through some depression.
*Literary element: Hemingway does a wonderful job describing how enlisting in the marines straight out of high school and coming home a man is a hard task. Hemingway shows this experience by using the setting as a literary element. Hemmingway is trying to show how Krebs is having difficulty adjusting to life as a "normal" person. Krebs comes back from war and he seems as if he comes home right where he left off. His mother still cooks for him, his father doesn’t seem to have a good relationship with him, the girls are different, and he really can’t figure what to do next. He has this set schedule of sleeping in, walking to the library, going home for lunch, sitting on the front porch, and playing pool. This shows that he is trying to adjust but it doesn’t seem to be working. Hemingway shows that his environment is different from where he left off and on top of that the character Krebs is different so it seems like too much to handle for Krebs.
*questions/comments: I think Hemingway wanted the reader to infer something from the character known as the father of Krebs but I really could not point out his meaning for doing that. The Father of Krebs is mentioned but really doesn’t play a big role. Did anybody make any inferences on Krebs’s father?
I think the father figure here may have represented who Krebs was "supposed" to be but since he isn't like his father at all, he seemed to avoid him. That is my interpretation.
ReplyDeleteI agree, I do wonder though why is the father character so minor? We only see him very vaguely, I think it might be because he was the complete opposite of what Krebs was, that we didn't really need to see him because Krebs didn't want to see him either. For example only the mother tried to tell him to go talk to the father, and if she represented the whole town than his father most likely represented something even worse seeing that Krebs didn't want to see him at ALL.
DeleteThe father is pretty absent in the story, and that sort of implies he and Krebs don't have much of a relationship. His father never has a direct interaction with him, and only really communicates through the mother. Maybe that represents a lack of guidance in Krebs' life, or is sort of echoing a feeling of detachment in the family.
ReplyDeleteI personally think that he feels detached the most from his father and that he does not really like him. I think maybe his father was too hard on him or tried to control him too much before he went to war.
ReplyDeleteI think the father wasn't mentioned as much in the story, because I don't think he played a big role in Krebs' life. It seems as though to be me the father is a workaholic and he had to be that way to provide for his family. With the father being at work most of the time doesn't give him much opportunity to spend time with his son or anyone for that matter. I don't think Krebs and his father ever had the chance to develop that true father and son bond.
ReplyDeleteI believe that his father is a traditional working man for the early 1900's. He probably worked the regular 9-5 to support the family but not bad guy. It seems to me that Hemingway did not want you, as the reader, to develop any sort of connection with anyone but Kreb's because otherwise the story would not be the same. The only person that Hemingway wanted you to feel for was Kreb's and he does a masterful job in doing so.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Roxanne.