A Farewell to Arms
In Hemingway?s book, A Farewell to Arms, there are many moral lessons to be learned.
One of the primary lessons is to be prepared and expect the unexpected. Many instances in
the novel support this idea. For instance, the main character, Frederic Henry, never dreams
that he will fall in love with Catherine Barkley. At first, he only wishes to use her and take
advantage of her situation, but later, he begins to look past his lustful desires and truly love
Catherine. The irony that Hemingway uses sets the tone for the many unexpected events.
At the beginning of the novel when Catherine and Frederic first meet, Frederic
makes it very clear that he does not intend to fall in love with her. He says plainly that he
does not love her and he has no intention to. He is only playing a game with her, like
bridge, in which words are used instead of cards (Hemingway 30). His intentions are only to
play this cruel game with Catherine to get her into his bed. He has no real desire to love her,
but later after all the experiences they go through together, their love matures. When they
escape to Switzerland they are so deeply in love that they want
farwell, arms, frederic, love, hemingway, unexpected, catherine, war, never, situation, , wishes, together, through, switzerland, plan, novel, mentally, lives, lessons, later, hospital, good, game, first, fall, expect, events, encounters, begins, wounds, words, witnesses, watches, warns, very, unforeseen, underestimate, two, aspects, truly, traumatizing, life-threatening, tone, toll, play, escape, realizes, themselves, power, average, armed, telling, telgen
