This essay is an attempt to examine A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway, within the critical theoretical framework of Chris Weedon’s essay, ‘Feminism and the Principles of Post Structuralism’. At the heart of feminist post structuralism lies the theory of post structuralism itself. The theory offers a way to study the conditions of how knowledge is produced. To understand an object it is necessary to study both the object and the systems within which it is produced and lives. Post-feminist structuralism seeks to examine the production of knowledge as it impacts on gender. The pervasiveness of male discourse is a particular target for post-structuralist feminism. What I hope to achieve is an analysis of the theory in relation to the character of Catherine Barkley and her romantic relationship with the novel’s narrator and protagonist Frederick Henry.

For poststructuralist theory the common factor in the analysis of social organization, social meanings, power and individual consciousness is language. Language is the place where actual and possible forms of social organization and their likely social and political consequences are defined and contested.

Weedon in Storey, ed. (555)

However, within Hemingway’s novels language is used to different effect, or rather the omission of it is. Hemingway’s aversion to theory is discussed in Owens-Murphy’s essay on pragmatism. She quotes Scott Donaldson as saying both Hemingway and his characters show, “a disinclination to philosophize, much”(87). Hemingway’s own theory of omission is based on the knowledge of the writer and their ability to get the point across in the simplest way. By including omissions within the writing Hemingway felt the reader was able to see things from their own perspective. Hemingway’s Theory of Omission states that if a writer has enough knowledge on a topic he is writing about, and gets his point across in the simplest way, then that is when the reader is able to appreciate and understand the story the best. Hemingway feels that when a writer includes omissions or breaks in their writing, this gives the reader a chance to see things in their own perspective. These breaks allow the reader to think about the kind of tone and setting the story may have and to actively think about the characters independently rather than be led by the hand through the story.

As Owens-Murphy notes in her essay ‘critics have noted Hemingway’s aversion to theory and abstraction and his penchant for the practical and the concrete’(87). I will admit that this is where I begin to become confused. Post structuralist theorists would have us construct Catherine and Frederick’s world using language, feminist post structuralist theorists defining their roles by gender. By doing this they consign Frederick to a world of macho war mongering whereby a young man travels hundreds of miles to be an American in an Italian war, ferrying the wounded and the dead from danger to safety; drinking and whoring by night, even contracting gonorhea at one point from the prostitutes he visits. Catherine is defined by the dominance she allows Frederick Henry to have over her. She is criticised for being a supplicant to his needs and desires.

Catherine Barkley and the historical context of the First World War.

Prior to the First World War the position of women within British society was largely unseen within the public sphere. So called ‘women’s work’ (Smith, 2000) was mainly domestic service and was considered inferior to work done by men, reflected in the disparity of pay between the sexes. Added to which was the idea that once women were married they would give up work and revert to their natural roles within the private sphere of wife and mother. The First World War played a central role in the social movement of women from the domestic to the public sphere. Whilst men fought the war on the continent women were expected to maintain the running of the country, everything from agriculture to architecture and everything in between.

But behind this seeming status quo things were happening. The beginning of the twentieth century found women in a very positive position. Progress, albeit fairly slow, had been made in the arenas of women’s general rights, education and the medical profession. The turn of the century found women pushing harder than ever for the right to vote, with the amalgamation of many smaller suffragette societies forming one larger union, the National Union of Women’s Suffragette Societies; women’s rights and their fight for them became part of the political agenda. One of the strongest arguments made against women’s right to equal citizenship with men was that as women were not able to represent their country on the field of battle (making the ultimate sacrifice) they should not be entitled to equal rights as men. Women had gone to war in previous conflicts, however their role was that of nurse, placed firmly within the hospitals units set up to care for the wounded. Once again confined to the role of ‘carer’. WW1 was the first opportunity women had to get closer to the front line and report back on it. First hand accounts of women’s experiences in WW1 were sent back and published, for public as well as private consumption.

However, the elevated role of women was somewhat exaggerated. Many male dominated professions still remained closed to women. Any examples of women in professions such as doctors or architects were used as propaganda and weren’t the norm. The majority of women were employed in munitions and transport and even then they were paid at lower rates than their male counterparts. For many women wartime labour experiences were a huge step forward in terms of social movement. Despite being employed female servants still existed only within the private, domestic sphere. Wartime employment for women meant a move from the private sphere to the public.

Against this backdrop of social movement Hemingway depicts Catherine as a woman who has travelled to the Italian front, to work in a hospital. It is said she followed her fiancé out to the front, staying for reasons that remain unspoken. It is possible that like Frederick Henry Catherine is seeking adventure on foreign shores, amorous or otherwise. For Frederick Henry sex is part of the fabric of his war, offered by the ‘whores’ who are located in a house that the officers regularly visit. Catherine is defying the expectations of the time she lives in by refusing the domestic sphere. Frederick Henry has perhaps not realised the strength of will Catherine has. She chooses to give herself completely to the affair with him because she was not able to give herself to her now deceased fiancé. “I wanted to do something for him. You see I didn’t care about the other thing and he could have had it all […]” (18). Through her experiences with her fiancé Catherine possess the insight that death is the end of everything. Catherine has gained a maturity, through her age and experiences, that Frederick Henry lacks.

However, many of the advances made were temporary as there was a post war backlash against women employed in typically male dominated employment. Married women in particular were singled out with widows and single women themselves protesting that those women employed and married should give up their jobs. Men lucky enough to have returned from the war came back to Britain and reclaimed their jobs and even those areas traditionally seen as female strongholds were subject to competition from disabled servicemen who needed employment.

Hemingway and the accusations of sexism and homoerotic undertones.

Judith Fetterly has argued in her essay ?? that the character of Catherine in AFTA helps to prove that Hemingway was both sexist and a misogynist. The assertion is that he hated women and that the characterization of Catherine proves it. I am not going to enter into the argument of Hemingway as ‘woman hater’ but I would like to examine why it is that feminist critics of Catherine find her such a weak character.

For the purposes of this piece of work it could be argued that one of the reasons why wars are fought by nations is to defend their right to shape their future. However, within this ideal is the notion that individuals interact with each other in wartime with the belief that today is all they have, tomorrow may never come. Both ideas are true, but it could be said that this is the dichotomy of war. Love and romance in war literature is problematic. Novels such as A Farewell to Arms construct a world in which love affairs can live and die within a short space of time. ‘The spontaneous union between two people who may never see each other again, each seeking solace in the other under strange circumstances in a strange place’ Pozorski (80).

I found it difficult to reconcile Fetterly’s attack of Catherine Barkley with my own opinions. The feminist attacks on Catherine make her sound too good to be true, subjugating her own sense of self in order to make Frederick Henry be in love with her. Fetterly assigns Catherine the role of unattainable goddess. As per ?? analysis of still life in A Farewell to Arms Catherine is fits in with the rest of the landscape, for Frederick Henry’s aesthetic appreciation, a feast for his senses. Frederick Henry’s thoughts of Catherine often mingle with his memories of food and drink. Fetterly’s appreciation is of Catherine as just one more object within Frederick Henry’s life as he experiences it in the war.

At first glance Catherine is subservient to Frederick Henry and to his desires. Her desire is only for what he wants. “I’m good. Aren’t I good? You don’t want any other girls, do you?...You see? I’m good. I do what you want.” (106). From this and other dialogue like it our impression is that Catherine lives only for Frederick Henry’s approval, that he is everything to her. Further on in the novel, when Frederick Henry is wounded, we see Catherine working all day and having sex with her lover all night. Her greatest worry is that she is not as good as the girls he has been with in his past. Even during Catherine’s labour with their baby her worry is that she is a burden on Frederick Henry. "'Oh, I wanted so to have this baby and not make trouble, and now I'm all done and all gone to pieces and it doesn't work'" (322).

But what if Catherine chooses obedience as a means to an end? What if she has decided that having spent eight years with her fiancé and never having consummated their union that the next time she ‘falls in love’ it will be on her terms? That, despite the feminist criticisms of Catherine as a character, what she is doing is choosing the only method at her disposal, that of compliant self-sacrificing woman to subvert societies expectations of the time.

Rather that Catherine’s contradictions are contradictions because they are part of her construction. Forces outside do determine her character and Catherine is clearly a reflection of male psychology and male fantasy. But what Catherine has done is construct her character in order to gain the freedom she desires on the only terms available to her, a freedom that is given to men as a matter of course. Catherine’s attempts to experience romantic love are thwarted when her fiancé is killed. Catherine perhaps has realised that by playing the game by the rules is no guarantee of reward. She is clearly a strong woman, a woman who has disobeyed the customs of her time in choosing to go to Italy to be a VSAD and take care of the wounded. Admittedly her adventure comes as a result of her fiancés adventure, what we have is a snapshot of Catherine within a time and placed fixed by Frederick Henry’s narration. But when he dies she is free and rather than comply with society’s expectations she goes to Italy and finally claims an adventure of her own in the shape of Frederick Henry and their subsequent life together.

Catherine runs from tradition and has become someone who has removed herself from complying with the customs of her time. Frederick wants to do the decent thing and marry her but is shocked when he realises that Catherine won’t marry him. Catherine, after learning she is pregnant says to Frederick, ‘Life isn’t hard to manage when you have nothing to lose.’ Perhaps Catherine as she is depicted by Hemingway in FTA could not have existed outside of wartime. Love in wartime is problematic.

Traber asks how ‘should a reader approach the characterization of Catherine Barkley?’ Perspectives on Catherine have ranged from Simone de Beauvoir reading her as a ‘human being’ to many critics seeing her as simply a sexual temptation. Could Catherine be both? In my opinion, yes, she can and does become both. But the strain of the performance sometimes shows, when her more cynical side comes out.

In war couples live with the idea they may never see each other again. Adhering to traditional morality no longer remains the overwhelming concern. And as Catherine points out, if they had married they would have had to separate (114). Catherine pragmatically chooses immorality by the standards of her age over conforming to society’s expectations and their resultant separation.

Sex before marriage became more commonplace during the period within which the novel is set. But as Cott points out (11) more than one sexual partner could be the death of a woman’s reputation , in an age when such things still mattered strongly. Catherine’s choice of an intimate relationship with Frederick Henry is morally ambiguous, but it is her choice, made with both willingness and wilfulness. Catherine’s chooses to perform her role in such a way that places Frederick Henry in a seemingly dominant position over her. But by doing so she achieves her aim of having an intimate relationship, the relationship she was denied with her fiancé.

Up until Frederick Henry meets Catherine we find out from the novel that he has had experiences with the prostitutes that are living in their town. In the novel Frederick Henry tells us as narrator that there are ‘two bawdy houses’. Hemingway’s depictions of the soldier’s encounters with the prostitutes is typical of wartime frontline behaviour. Words such as honour and glory stand alongside the vast numbers of soldiers who frequented brothels. As Moddelmog explains, when the Americans entered into the war their soldiers were expected to behaviour themselves. Moddelmog quotes Bristow, brothels previously tolerated, are shut down (9) and the American government becomes involved by pledging, ‘men committed to its charge will be returned to the homes and communities that so generously gave them with no scars except those won in honourable conflict.’

We do not learn of Frederick Henry’s reasons for being an American in the Italian army. Whenever he is pressed to answer why he joined up he is evasive and there are several occurences of this within the novel. One possible explanation outside of the text could be that Frederick Henry, by joining the Italian army escapes the US training camps with their emphasis on morally upright behaviour.

Homo-erotic theories are commonplace to Hemingway’s works. In recent times critics have concentrated on what Hemingway as a man brings to his work. Moddelmog discusses the removal of a passage that intimates a homosexual relationship between Frederick Henry and the priest of the town where he is billeted. Max Perkins, Hemingway’s publisher, was able to justify the removal of the passage on the grounds that it would affect the marketability of the story. Clearly he was unwilling to offend his less worldly readers. Moddelmog asserts the passage could be cut without damage to the story and instead states there is a ‘queer sensibility’ underwriting the connections between the characters in the whole of the novel. Whilst I am choosing not to engage fully with the ‘queer sensibilities’ of A Farewell to Arms I would like to examine the ‘Queer gaze’ in relation to Catherine and Frederick Henry’s relationship. What the queer gaze does is highlight ‘the other’ and for the purposes of this essay the main character’s romantic relationship could be construed as ‘the other’. It exists outside of the social norms of the time and perhaps given the behaviour of Catherine, deliberately so? Catherine throws herself into the relationship with Frederick Henry and from the beginning is willing to give him what she was unable to give her fiancé.

In the character of Catherine Barkley we someone strong and vital enough to construct a performance of a women determine to get what she wants from life and willing to ignore the normative values of her society in order to achieve her goal. Critics have repeatedly misunderstood Catherine Barkley and those who approach such criticisms from a feminist perspective have, in my opinion, failed to pay close attention to the strength she exhibits throughout the novel. Feminist critics have categorised Catherine as shallow and subservient. But Catherine repeated shows her how strong her character. It is clear to see her bravery in the final scenes of the book, when she gives birth to their stillborn child. Even though Catherine knows she is dying she is able to face up to her fate and accept it. She finds herself in the role of comforter to Frederick Henry, even though it is her life that is coming to an end. Despite his obviously masculine pursuits of going to war and consuming quantities of alcohol and visiting prostitutes, as well as getting wounded – albeit in a less than heroic way – Frederick Henry is not the hero of A Farewell to Arms; Catherine Barkley is.

Bibliography

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