Soldiers Home - Literary Analysis
A soldier returning home from war should be a time of celebration and relief. However, not all soldiers feel like they can, or even want to come home again. In his story, Soldiers Home, Ernest Hemingway tells us the tale of a young soldier, Howard Krebs, who reluctantly returns home from World War I. On the surface, Krebs appears to be suffering from the results of a traumatic war time experience. However, this experience is not caused from something attributed to his time on the battlefield. Krebs struggles to stay true to himself and maintain his integrity, while trying to fit in again amongst the townspeople, as well as foster any type of romantic relationship. I believe war changed Krebs by showing him a new world beyond his small mid-western home town.
Upon his return home, Krebs finds that the townspeople are not interested in hearing his stories about the war, but instead, “Krebs found that to be listened to at all he had to lie” (1). For Krebs, lying led him to start rejecting his experience in war as being meaningful. “A distaste for everything that had happened to him in the war set in because of the lies he had told” (1). This indicates that Krebs feels he did something worthwhile and meaningful in the war. Krebs goes on to refer to this as “the one thing, the only thing for a man to do, easily and naturally” (1). Hemingway never tells what that one thing was. However, due to all the lying, the “one thing,” that kept Krebs going through the war was no longer something that held any integrity for him. Many years ago I went through a very traumatic experience in my life similar to Krebs. The more I tried to forget what happen the more I became isolated and withdrawn from life and ...
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...shows that Krebs is longing for what he once had, but struggles to find it again back home.
In the story not only does Krebs struggle with his longing for a romantic relationship, but he also struggles to maintain his integrity and hold on to what good he can remember from his time in the war. Hemingway tells us “People seems to think it was rather ridiculous for Krebs to be getting back so late, years after the war was over” (1). Krebs even states “He did not want to come home” (1). With these statements, Hemingway shows that the war changed Krebs from the young man he was, in this small mid-western town where nothing changes, to a more critical and complicated individual. With that change he has developed a taste for the world and how he wants to live in it.
Works Cited
Hemingway, Ernest. “Soldier’s Home.” In Our Time. New York: Scribner, 1925. 67-77. Print.
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Krebs is a detached being who just wants to keep his life as uncomplicated as possible. He doesn't receive the same hearty welcome as his fellow soldiers, thanks to his returning home so much later than the rest. At first he doesn't want to talk about the war, presumably because of the atrocities he experienced there, but when he later feels the need to talk about it, no one w...
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...egular job or move out" (Waldhorn 9). Both Hemingway and Krebs moved out and got jobs. Beyond a doubt, Hemingway wrote from his past experiences. In "Indian Camp," Hemingway used his own relationship with his father to breathe life into the fictional characters of Nick and his father. By leaving his childhood and entering the war, Hemingway recalled his own accounts of injuries and love that made up the character Henry and Barkley in A Farewell to Arms. And finally, with his return home after the war, Hemingway uses Krebs in "Soldier's Home" to express his distaste for the home life.
The novel "Soldier's Home" manifests that in order for life to go smoothly with no complications there are solutions with taking the easy path. One way this work proves this point is through a theme. Theme is a central message through the literary work. In the story, Hemingway mentioned, "Vaguely he wanted a girl, but he did not want to work to get her" stating how Krebs wanted to get a girlfriend (Hemingway 2). Also as Krebs discussed with his mother about what he was going to do with his life, Krebs actions were to get a job to please her. He comprehended that getting the job k...
The initial reaction I received from reading Soldier's Home, and my feelings about Soldier's Home now are not the same. Initially, I thought Harold Krebs is this soldier who fought for two years, returns home, and is disconnected from society because he is in a childlike state of mind, while everyone else has grown up. I felt that Krebs lost his immature years, late teens to early 20's, because he went from college to the military. I still see him as disconnected from society, because there isn't anyone or anything that can connect him to the simple life that his once before close friends and family are living. He has been through a traumatic experience for the past two years, and he does not have anyone genuinely interested in him enough to take the time to find out what's going on in his mind and heart. Krebs is in a battle after the battle.
First, if there was a point made of the setting what would this story be like? Would Kreb’s be in Paris or Germany still? Would he have come home earlier if he knew it was a more bustling town? Hemmingway made the point of setting this story in a slow Oklahoma town that had no prospects of getting any better. Krebs was out of a Methodist college and went straight to the war (133). Krebs knew the lifestyle that he left behind and what would be expected of him when he returned. His family expected a return to his pre-war state of a young man out of college. The setting in Oklahoma probably did not entice Krebs any longer and he hungered for something better than settling down and becoming a working man. New York City or even Los Angeles might have created a different setting for Kreb’s. Maybe these towns might have offered a more exciting lifestyle for this young man. Hemmingway is maybe trying to portray that Kreb’s was held down by consequences of the war and this Oklahoma town would again have consequences for Kreb’s. Marriage, children, and a steady job were these the consequences Kreb’s spoke of when he mentioned courting the women in this town? Possibly, and he knew that he wasn’t going to live a lie any longer.
As a first hand observer of the Civil War, the great American Poet, Walt Whitman once said,"The real war [of the mind] will never get in the books."Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a horrible mental ailment that afflicts thousands of soldiers every year. Besides the fact that it is emotionally draining for the soldier, it also deeply alters their family and their family dynamics. Ernest Hemingway’s “Soldier's Home” illustrates how this happens. Harold Krebs returns home from World War I. He has to deal with becoming reaccustomed to civilian life along with relearning social norms. He must also learn about his family and their habits. The ramifications of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder have a ripple effect on the lives of not only the victim, but also the friends and family they relate to.
Hemingway uses the book to explain the brutality of war and the burdens it places to those who becomes victims of it. It is a lesson Lieutenant Henry learns early on during the book, and it is one that we as a society should keep in mind especially in these ever cautious time we live in. It also gives the reader a chance to view the insight of those who participated in the action of wars, and in chapter XXVI we are reminded of these peoples’ views through the statements made by the priest in Henry’s quarters. He proclaims, “You cannot believe how it has been. Except that you have been there and you know how it can be. Many people have realized the war this summer. Officers whom I thought could never realize it realize it now.