English 1002, Section 02
29 April 2012
Literary Analysis of Harold Krebs from “Soldier’s Home” In Ernest Hemingway’s short story “Soldier’s Home”, Harold Krebs is a young man who returns home to Oklahoma from World War I. Krebs arrives with the second division in the summer of 1919. The citizens were no longer interested in the returning soldiers. Things had gone back to normal and no one wanted to listen to his war stories. He had to start telling lies to get attention. Things had not changed much back at home, but he has changed due to his experiences. Since his return from the war, he has different thoughts on dating and his future. He wants a girl, but he does not want to spend the time to talk to one. His mother wants him to be normal like the other men his age. Because of Krebs bad war experiences and treatment upon his return, he becomes apathetic, unusual, and immature. Krebs is apathetic. His apathy begins when he returns home from the war. The narrator says, “Krebs, who had been at Belleau Wood, Soissons, the Champagne, St. Mihiel, and in the Argonne did not want to talk about the war at all” in order to emphasize his traumatic experiences in the war (187). These battles were the most horrifying places of the war. His apathetic attitude is developed because he had to lie in order to get his friends and families attention. John Mckenna and David Raabe say, “By adulterating his war experience with verbal misrepresentation, Krebs “Lost everything” (3). This means that he has lost his pride and creates a “distastes for everything that had happened to him in the war” (187). Krebs is no longer interested in talking about the war and he also restrains himself from loving anyone. Krebs is also unusual. Instead of looking for a girl and trying to find a job, he detaches himself from everyone. Krebs says to his mother, “I don’t love anybody” when she asks him if he loves her (191). He did not want to love anyone and he did not want anyone to love him, which is unusual because most people need to love someone or something. Mckenna and Raabe also state, “For him love is not an idea that builds a satisfying world; rather it is a notion that weaves snares and entanglements” (8). Krebs tries to avoid complications or consequences. “He practiced on his clarinet, strolled down town, read, and went to bed” is an example of Krebs having an unusual approach to life (188). Most of the guys were getting married and finding good jobs. Marjorie Smelstor says, “Brief, simple and repetitious, this series of ‘He did not wants’ catalogs the ways in which Harold Krebs intends to remain uninvolved, detached, and restrained (3795). Another character trait that Krebs has is immaturity. His immaturity is emphasized when the narrator says, “He was sleeping late in bed, getting up to walk down town to the library to get a book, eating lunch at home, reading on the front porch until he became bored…” (188). He cannot face reality and has no ambitions in life. His immaturity is mainly due to the way his parents treat him. His parents come to an agreement allowing him to use the car “In the evenings” to take girls riding with him (189). This act may seem like a big deal, but he is an adult who should take matters into his own hands by getting a job to support himself. Charles Oliver states, “His parents are religious fundamentalists, treating him on his return from Europe as they had when he was a young teenager before the war. And they have no concept of what their son has been through” (342-43). Krebs is immature because he should not be letting his parents treat him the same way they were before he left. He has experienced war, which no man should have to experience. He should be taking control of his life instead of allowing his parents the opportunity to try and control him. This creates resentment towards them.
Throughout the story, Harold Krebs tries to keep his life as simple. He is traumatized from the way he was treated upon his return and also from his war experiences. Krebs is searching for attention in order to become normal again. When no one is there to listen to him he detaches himself from his family and friends. He loses his ambition and motivation to get a job or talk to girls to keep things less complicated. He realizes that he is the only one that has changed in his hometown and tries to deal with his change by lying to people including his own mother. He leaves his hometown to run away from his complications and satisfy his parents at the same time.

Works Cited
Heminway, Ernest. “Soldier’s Home.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 9th ed. Ed. Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 187-92. Print.
McKenna, John J. and David M. Raabe. “Using Temperament Theory to Understand Conflict in Hemingway’s ‘Soldier’s Home’.” Studies in Short Fiction 34. 2 (1997): 203-13. Academic Search Complete. Web. 30 April 2012.
Oliver, Charles M. Critical Companion to Ernest Hemingway: A Literary Reference to His Life and Work. New York: Facts on File, 2007. 341-43. Print
Smelstor, Marjorie. Masterplots II: Short story series. Vol. 7. Ed. Charles May. Pasadena, California: Salem Press, 2004. 3793-95. Print. 8 vols.