Hemingway, Hounded by the Feds

The New York Times ^ | 01 July 2011 | A. E. Hotchner

[Palter]

EARLY one morning, 50 years ago today, while his wife, Mary, slept upstairs, Ernest Hemingway went into the vestibule of his Ketchum, Idaho, house, selected his favorite shotgun from the rack, inserted shells into its chambers and ended his life.

There were many differing explanations at the time: that he had terminal cancer or money problems, that it was an accident, that he’d quarreled with Mary. None were true. As his friends knew, he’d been suffering from depression and paranoia for the last year of his life.

Ernest and I were friends for 14 years. I dramatized many of his stories and novels for television specials and film, and we shared adventures in France, Italy, Cuba and Spain, where, as a pretend matador with Ernest as my manager, I participated in a Ciudad Real bullfight. Ernest’s zest for life was infectious.

In 1959 Ernest had a contract with Life magazine to write about Spain’s reigning matadors, the brothers-in-law Antonio Ordóñez and Luis Miguel Dominguín. He cabled me, urging me to join him for the tour. It was a glorious summer, and we celebrated Ernest’s 60th birthday with a party that lasted two days.

But I remember it now as the last of the good times.

In May 1960, Ernest phoned me from Cuba. He was uncharacteristically perturbed that the unfinished Life article had reached 92,453 words. The contract was for 40,000; he was having nightmares.

A month later he called again. He had cut only 530 words, he was exhausted and would it be an imposition to ask me to come to Cuba to help him?

I did, and over the next nine days I submitted list upon list of suggested cuts.

[Palter]

Ernest Hemingway- FBI Vault

[Tainan]

Tuff case.
An acquaintance of my Fathers' was an acquaintance of Hemmingway. He didn't mention much about it other than to speak of the contrast from his younger days and to his last few years.
A great difference. Looks like the gov't drove him mad. Cages don't always have bars.

[Soothesayer9]

While the man was a genius with the pen, he was definitely a man who cared not what God would think about him blowing his brains out.

[Georgia Girl 2]

Well look what they did to poor Richard Jewell. He was the security guard that was actually a hero in the Atlanta Olympic park bombing but the FBI got it into their head that he was a suspect and they hounded that guy for months and months. I am suprised he did not commit suicide. It was really horrible.

[Beowulf9]

I know he had health problems and felt hounded by the FBI but he was an alcoholic, and that breeds depression.

[Palter]

felt hounded by the FBI

The FBI followed him and tapped his phones. Everyone reacts differently.

[ottbmare]

While the man was a genius with the pen, he was definitely a man who cared not what God would think about him blowing his brains out.

Do not judge. God (and the church) have compassion for people who destroy themselves when they're mentally ill.

[fullchroma]

Compare Hemingway’s FBI interference with what, say, Sara Palin endures. The FBI didn’t cause his depression, decline and demise. It was incidental.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

While the man was a genius with the pen, he was definitely a man who cared not what God would think about him blowing his brains out.

I wonder if God is more forgiving than you are?

[boop]

I was told by by English teacher that he killed himself because of his health, depression, and that he was impotent. He could no longer enjoy all the “good things” in life, so he saw no point in continuing.

[Beowulf9]

“The FBI followed him and tapped his phones. Everyone reacts differently.”

Especially when drinking heavily on a regular basis. Drinking makes your problems overwhelming.

[fight_truth_decay]

Decoding Woody Allen’s ‘Midnight in Paris’

Enjoyable film now playing.

[Talisker]

While the man was a genius with the pen, he was definitely a man who cared not what God would think about him blowing his brains out.

May God, in His infinite mercy, give you severe depression, and may it last until you see your arrogance and develop compassion.

[Charlespg]

or in severe never ending pain,Hemingway had cancer supposedly

[fight_truth_decay]

The Second World War The United States entered World War II on December 8, 1941, and for the first time in his life, Hemingway sought to take part in naval warfare.

Aboard the Pilar, now a Q-Ship, Hemingway's crew was charged with sinking German submarines threatening shipping off the coasts of Cuba and the United States.

Hemingway came under surveillance by the FBI both during World War II and afterwards (most probably because of his long association with marxist Spanish Civil War veterans who were again active in Cuba) for his residence and activities in Cuba.

"....the Hemingway account "The Shot"[ is used by Cabrera Infante] and others as evidence of conflict between Hemingway and Fidel Castro dating back to 1948 and the killing of "Manolo" Castro, a friend of Hemingway.

He was receiving treatment in Ketchum, Idaho for high blood pressure and liver problems, this may in fact have helped to precipitate his suicide, since he reportedly suffered significant memory loss as a result of the shock treatments.

In a particularly gruesome suicide, he rested the gun butt of the double-barreled shotgun on the floor of a hallway in his home, leaned over it to put the twin muzzles to his forehead just above the eyes, and pulled both triggers. The coroner, at request of the family, did not do an autopsy. Other members of Hemingway's immediate family also committed suicide, including his father, Clarence Hemingway, his siblings Ursula and Leicester, and his granddaughter Margaux Hemingway.

Some believe that certain members of Hemingway's paternal line had a hereditary disease known as haemochromatosis (bronze diabetes), in which an excess of iron concentration in the blood causes damage to the pancreas and also causes depression or instability in the cerebrum.

Best of all he loved the fall
The leaves yellow on the cottonwoods
Leaves floating on the trout streams
And above the hills
The high blue windless skies
Now he will be a part of them forever
Ernest Hemingway - Idaho - 1939
http://www.ernesthemingway.org.uk/

[fight_truth_decay]

You do not know much about Hemingway to make that kind of a statement, do you—

http://www.ernesthemingway.org.uk/

or read the short version above...

those of us who have suicide in our families might find you insensitive

[Ciexyz]

I saw the Woody Allen film and although it was a highly imaginative film, the leftie politics and cheap shots against conservatives hurt.

[Bigtigermike]

Hemingway was mentally ill at the end of his life..

[Sherman Logan]

I found the posted comments interesting, as pretty much all of them make the assumption that FBI surveillance of Hemingway was unjustified or tyrannical.

In actual fact, not only was he a strong Communist sympathizer, it appears he was a KGB agent for quite a number of years and was finally dropped by them for lack of productivity, not resigning himself.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/jul/09/hemingway-failed-kgb-spy

http://books.google.com/books?id=LQptupxaGwsC&pg=PA511&lpg=PA511&dq=hemingway+communist&source=bl&ots=5nhXI48R9e&sig=hfAZqzmOGRO18etSWeNoZTmVCsE&hl=en&ei=4U0RTqexIKrk0QHd2Oi-Dg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CDUQ6AEwAzgK#v=onepage&q=soviet&f=false

IOW, he was a conscious and voluntary secret agent of a foreign power dedicated to the subversion and overthrow of the United States Constitution. What was inappropriate at all about the FBI keeping an eye on him?

[unkus]

Hemmingway was either in or associated with the Lincoln Brigade. Mostly American lefties.