Ernest Hemingway: la simplicitat com a estil

Abstract

Immediately after having launched his professional career, Ernest Hemingway became one of the leading and most influential writers of English literature and has managed to maintain this position to the present date. The impact of his significant contribution to the modernization of the novel has been carefully analysed in many countries, but has had a very poor reception in Catalonia. This paper sets out to demonstrate the importance of increasing the study of this author's works in our academic institutions, due to the value of their content and meaning. To do so, it has been divided into two main sections. On the one hand, the examination of the underlying intricacies of Hemingway's supposedly simple narrative technique, the chief influences that shaped his style and the thoughts and emotions embedded in his plots and themes. On the other hand, the complexity of rendering his works into the Catalan language whilst maintaining the essence and particularities of the novelist's prose. To illustrate this, new translations of three of Hemingway's short stories will be provided, which will be subsequently compared with the original texts and the first published adaptations. By the end of this paper, both of its parts will have proven the much needed exhaustive research on Hemingway's narrative, which would ameliorate the literature programs offered by Catalan universities.