What is "Big Two-Hearted River Really About?"

By Carlvert Green, Hemingway Short Story Team

Upon reading Ernest Hemingway’s short “Big Two-Hearted River,” the initial question to ask is “what is the story really about?” or “how should we interpret this?” In order to answer this question, the reader must look at the story on two different levels, first on the very surface, and literal level to get a grasp on what the story is that is being told. The second level to examine the story at is under the surface which is done by looking at how the figurative language, word choice, and placing the short story in its original written context may lead to new interpretations of the story. Lastly, I will explore how the “Hemingway Short Story Project” at UCSB represents some of these new found understandings that we get when we examine the text under the surface.

Examining the text on a literal level is an important first step because it assures that we as readers know what is happening in the text on the most basic level. If this most basic level is not looked at and understood, there is no way that one can move on to the under-the surface analysis. The first thing that the reader can say the story is literally about is Nick Adams. Nick is the main character in the short story and the only character which the reader gets to experience the story through, while others are only mentioned in passing or as memories. Because all of the action in the story is centered on him, the obvious answer is that the story is about Nick. Another answer to this question is that the story is literally about hiking and fishing. Both Nick’s trek up to his camp, as well as Nick’s experience fishing in the river clearly take up the bulk of the text, and therefore it can be said that it is in fact what the text is about. Thirdly, on a literal level the text is about Nick returning to somewhere familiar. In part I of the story the narrator creates a very nostalgic feeling where Nick looks over hills and expects to see something, or “he felt all the old feeling” in order to make it clear that this is a place that Nick has been before and feels comforablt. And lastly, one could say that the short story is literally about presenting an aesthetically pleasing environment. Through the use of repetition of fairly simplistic words Hemingway almost paints a picture of what the landscape looks like through its elevations, its textures, and its temperatures. As this vivid imagery runs consistent throughout the entire short story, it is easy to see how a reader can assume that a main purpose of this text is to tell about an amazing place. In summation, on a very literal level “The Big Two Hearted-River” is about this extremely beautiful place that Nick Adams visits and seems to be very familiar with. While in this beautiful place Nick Adams experiences feelings of great nostalgia while fulfilling his ultimate goal of hiking the trails to a desirable camp spot, and fishing in the river. However, this literal level does not provide enough insight to truly understand the story.

Now that the story has been examined on the most literal level, it can be looked at under the surface. Perhaps the most important thing to look at in order to examine the text under the surface is putting it in context. Reading parts I and II alone, as one short story gives a completely different impression than if it is read in In Our Time. In Our Time is a collection of short stories by Ernest Hemingway, many of which Nick is the main character. One of the things that we lean about Nick through these other stories is that Nick was a soldier and he went to war. This fact alone gives “Big Two-Hearted River” an entirely different reading and opens up so many different possibilities for interpretation. One such new possibility is that “Big Two-Hearted River” is about achieving closure.

Closure is defined by The Oxford English Dictionary as “A sense of personal resolution; a feeling that an emotionally difficult experience has been conclusively settled or accepted.” Robert Paul Lamb’s article titled “Fishing for stories: what ‘Big Two-Hearted River’ is really about” says that earlier stories about Nick Adams reveal that he experiences shellshock, or what is now called post-traumatic stress and this point supports the idea that “Big Two-Hearted River” is really about closure. Post-traumatic stress disorder is said to be caused by experiencing a traumatic event that has a huge impact on ones life (medicinenet.com). It is said that people who experience this have mental health issues ranging from depression, to a feeling of uncertainty in everyday life. Lamb’s article, the definition of post-traumatic stress disorder, and the symptoms that occur with it all work together to confirm that “Big Two-Hearted River” is about Nick Adams obtaining closure, but the next question to pose is what in the text supports also supports this argument.

One aspect of the text that supports the closure theory is the issue of familiarity that was discussed earlier. As stated earlier there are instances in the text where it becomes apparent that this area holds some kind of familiarity with Nick, and perhaps through this familiarity he can obtain the closure that he is seeking. Shellshock is said to be a very disorienting experience so it is obvious that a way to become reoriented is by visiting something that is familiar. Another aspect of the text that supports the closure theory is Nick’s reminiscence of his friend Hopkins. As Nick is making coffee he is reminded of his old friend and the narrator begins to take the readers on a trip through Nick’s mind, detailing Nick and Hopkins’ experiences with coffee making, talking about Hopkins girlfriends, and even them fishing on the Black River. This part of the story is very indicative of post-traumatic stress disorder as it is said that people that experience this will often have random flashbacks brought on by recognizing something from their past, just as all it takes is coffee to send Nick on a flashback. The paragraph ends very solemnly with “They never saw Hopkins again” which leads us to believe that Hopkins died during the war. Perhaps the death of Hopkins is the traumatic event in the past that Nick Adams has experienced, and the fact that the coffee immediately sends Nick into the past proves that he is in need of some closure.

The second possibility that comes up as a result of looking at the text under the surface is the idea that the story is about control, and this idea goes hand in hand with the idea of obtaining closure. According to medicinenet.com, people that experience post-traumatic stress disorder often feel like they have no control over their lives due to the random occurrences of flashbacks of their traumatic event. The idea here is that Nick Adams traveled to a familiar place so that he could still be in control of his life by choosing, for example, what trail to hike or at what point to fish in the river. This sense of control will come from the fact that he is already familiar with the place, and therefore can pick and choose (have control over) where he wants to go and what he wants to do.

One aspect of the story that proves the control theory happens when Nick is fishing and deciding which area to go to; the narrator says, “Of course, you could fish upstream, but in a stream like the Black, or this, you had to wallow against the current and in a deep place, the water piled up on you. It was no fun to fish upstream in this much current.” What takes place here is once again the readers are allowed inside of Nick’s head as he decides not go fish upstream. The reason that Nick provides is that it is no fun to fish in a heavy current, which may or may not be true when it comes to real fishing. However, what pops out about this passage is that the current, something that is controlled by nature and that Nick cannot possibly be in command of, is what holds him back from venturing to another part of the river. Another instance that shows Nick’s need to be in control is the end of the story. Nick is looking at the swamp at the end of the day and the readers are supplied with this description: “the swamp looked solid with cedar trees, their trunks close together, their branches solid.  It would not be possible to walk through a swamp like that.” Here again the readers are taken inside of Nick’s mind and he gives us the reason that he does not want to go to the swamp, which is basically because the swamp looks impossible to walk through. He also mentions the low hanging branches and the fact that the swamp may serve as a natural habitat for animals, which are all elements of nature and cannot be controlled by Nick.

One last thesis that can be presented after looking at the text under the surface is the idea that “Big Two-Hearted River” is about order. Once again, this idea is not too far away the ideas of obtaining closure and maintaining control. Nick Adams’ desire to have order in his life more than likely also stems from his bout with post-traumatic stress disorder. The first piece of textual evidence that supports this thesis is the simple diction that occurs throughout the “Big Two-Hearted River.” In “Fish story: ways of telling in ‘Big Two-Hearted River’” Don Summerhayes discusses the use of the many narrative voices in the story and suggests that this blending of voices serves the function of blurring the lines between the narrator and Nick. What this means is that at certain points in “Big Two-Hearted River” it seems as if Nick Adams and the narrator are the same person. This relates to Nick’s need for order because essentially the narrators use of simplistic diction can translate to Nick using simplistic diction. This use of simple, small descriptive words is indicative of a desire for order because by keeping things on a small, easy scale, they are easier to maintain. The descriptive nature of the words and their repetitions also support this thesis. The fact that Nick and the narrator paint such a vivid picture using the words, therefore making things easier to maintain and remember, show that Nick seeks order in his life.

The “Hemingway shot story project” at UC Santa Barbara also examines “Big Two-Hearted River” under the surface. The focus of the groups project is a map that represents the area that Nick Adams hikes, camps, and fishes and this map was developed through close reading of the text. It is through this examining of the text under the surface that the map was produced. The first theory that the project helps to prove is the theory of control in reference to the swamp. On the map the swamp looks completely different than everything else; the land that it is made of is significantly lower, the color is different than anything else on the map, and one can argue that the color looks even more peculiar than the black area that represents the burnt out town of Seney. The swamp is also a completely different texture than anything else on the map. The way that the group chose to represent the swamp supports the theory that Nick does not go there because it lacks control. The simple juxtaposition of the swamp with everything on the map, especially the simplicity of Nick’s camp really drives the point that the swamp is impenetrable and uncontrollable. The second theory that the “Hemingway Short Story Project” embodies is that the story is about Nick’s bout with shellshock (his desires for closure and order). The initial idea that the group had was to do a topography project where they mapped out the elevation that the narrator describes with such great detail. However, upon more close reading of the text, the group deciding to switch gears because they realized that the story was more about Nick’s subconscious and mentality than it as about the elevation or anything else. With this new realization came the idea to keep with the notion of presenting the elevation of the area that the story describes, but to put it all on a ball of some sort. The ball would represent Nick Adam’s head, and the fact that the map was built on top of it would represent that the area was more about Nick’s mental state, for example, the closure that he sought to obtain by going there. Unfortunately resources would not permit this idea, so the group used a piece of flat foam. Essentially the idea was that the flat surface area would represent an opened sphere, therefore keeping in line with the idea that the map is mental. Lastly, another decision that the group made was to record data on the map that told about the frequency of certain words about elevation, as well as words about Nick’s state of mind. Through this analysis of the words, the group was able to produce two graphs, one that details the elevation of the place that Nick is in, and the other that details the elevation of Nick’s state of mind, or how happy he is. Through the use of this graph the group discovered that as the elevation increases, so did Nick’s happiness. This evidence is also in support of the theory that the story is about Nick’s mental state because as stated, the physical aspects of the map correlate with Nick’s state of mind.

In conclusion, examining a text on both the surface level and then under the surface are probably the most important ways to read a text. The surface level is important to look at because it tells what the story is about on the most literal level and the more in-depth examination is important because it reveals the more important, overarching theme of the work. What perhaps is most interesting is that the “Hemingway Short Story Team” at UC Santa Barbara decided to look at the text in a different medium, and through this medium came support of the theories that were found when the text was examined under the surface. This fact really drives home the purpose of a course like Literature Plus, which focuses on a more interdisciplinary way of looking at literature.

Word Cited

1. Lamb, Robert Paul. "Fishing for stories: what "Big Two-Hearted River" is really about." Modern fiction studies 37.2 (1991):161-.
2. www.medicinenet.com
3.  Summerhayes, Don. "Fish story: ways of telling in "Big Two-Hearted River."." The Hemingway review 15.1 (1995):10-.