Quote of the Day: Novelist Ernest Hemingway on Self-Confrontation and Inner Work

Many writers and authors come to mind when you think of American literature. And one of the most influential writers in that camp is Ernest Hemingway. He was an American novelist, short-story writer and journalist, born on July 21, 1899. He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954 and was known for many things, including writing about masculinity, specifically writing male protagonists irrevocably changed by war. In writing characters like this—who often have issues that they want to escape or be rid of—our quote of the day by Hemingway highlights the impossibility of running away from yourself, and the importance of embracing inner work.

Hemingway started writing in high school and went on to work as a reporter for TheKansas City Star instead of going to college. He wasn’t able to enlist as a soldier in the military for World War I because of “a defective eye,” per Britannica, but he drove ambulances for the American Red Cross during the war instead. He was hurt in 1918 before his 19th birthday, and was “decorated for heroism” while hospitalized in Italy. 

He went back to working as a journalist in America post-WWI, but fellow American writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Gertrude Stein encouraged him to write more creatively. That’s when he wrote “his first important book” in 1925: In Our Time. 

On July 2, 1961, just a couple of weeks shy of his 62nd birthday, Hemingway died. He left behind quite a collection of poems, short stories and books, with a lot of wisdom and perspective we can use in our own lives. Today’s quote is a reflection of his thoughts on outrunning your problems and how traveling and partying won’t help you escape yourself.

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Quote of the Day by Ernest Hemingway

“You can’t get away from yourself by moving from one place to another.”

This quote is from his book, The Sun Also Rises, which came out in 1926 and is known as the “quintessential novel of the Lost Generation,” per the book’s description. Even though Gertrude Stein coined the term “Lost Generation” for those who reached adulthood in the decade before or during World War I, per Britannica, Hemingway used it (and popularized it) in this book, writing, “You are all a lost generation.”

The novel is about the “disillusionment and angst of the post-World War I generation,” and is considered one of Hemingway’s masterpieces, according to its description. The 1920s were called the “Roaring ‘20s” for a reason, and the book features characters partying it up at night and taking wild adventures and risks during the day. But the novel looks at what this lifestyle actually means for these characters, which might not be much. It also explores themes of love and death, masculinity, the power of nature and more.

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Deeper Meaning of Ernest Hemingway’s Quote—Embracing Self-Confrontation

This quote is spoken by Jake Barnes, who is the protagonist and narrator of The Sun Also Rises. He is an American WWI veteran who is now a journalist working abroad in Paris (with a lot of events and people in this book inspired by Hemingway’s own life). Jake says this line to Robert Cohn, who is another American, but rather a wealthy one living in Paris. Cohn was not involved in the war and still has a romantic view of the world, whereas Jake is more jaded and has a bit of a void in the morality department created by the war.

Essentially, Cohn is not happy with his lush lifestyle in Paris and wants to move and settle elsewhere. Something is missing, and he wants to fill it with travel and adventure. However, Jake tells him that “moving from one place to another” isn’t going to cure that feeling or fill that void, because it’s just going to end up feeling the same. That void Cohn’s feeling isn’t something that new scenery will fix. 

As Hemingway wrote in this book, you cannot run away from yourself and your mind. Moving zip codes, even if it’s across an ocean, might help in some ways and fix some problems. But if your issue is yourself—your brain, your emotions, your trauma, etc.—then moving around is just a bandaid on your foundational issues. 

Instead, it’s important to embrace self-confrontation and the effort of inner work. By really looking in the mirror and deciding to work on yourself, you’ll likely experience a new appreciation for your struggles and resilience, instead of looking for the next way to avoid facing any personal challenges.

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More Quotes from Ernest Hemingway

• “There is no friend as loyal as a book.”
• “There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.”
• “Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.”
• “There is nothing noble in being superior to your fellow man; true nobility is being superior to your former self.”
• “The best way to find out if you can trust somebody is to trust them.”
• “The most painful thing is losing yourself in the process of loving someone too much, and forgetting that you are special too.”

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