UpDate - Vol. 15, No. 6, Page 1
October 5, 1995
UD professor explores Hemingway's Cuba

     During his long and brilliant career as a writer, Ernest
Hemingway sometimes achieved a stature that seemed larger than life.
     In the years since his death, shortly before his 62nd birthday in
1961, interest in the 1954 Nobel Prize-winning author's life and work
has continued to grow.
     Nowhere is this interest more evident than in the island nation
of Cuba, where Richard Davison, UD professor of English, attended a
six-day conference of Hemingway scholars this summer.
     "Hemingway is a great hero in Cuba," Davison said. "There is a
warm feeling among the Cubans for him."
     The conference was held at The Old Man And The Sea Hotel, located
on the Hemingway Marina, just across the bay from Havana.
     During the conference, Davison said papers were presented, films
shown and tours given of the places where Hemingway ate, drank, lived
and worked.
     Among these popular sites is the Finca Vigia, a large white, one-
story house that sits on the 20-acre property that the author called
home during his 20-year sojourn in Cuba.
     Davison said the Finca Vigia has been preserved exactly the way
it was when Hemingway left the island in 1959, after the shooting of
his favorite dog, whom he called "Black Dog," by soldiers of Cuban
dictator Fulgencio Batista.
     Suspended above what was the tennis court is Hemingway's fishing
boat, the Pilar. Now completely restored, the boat is named after one
of the female characters in the novel For Whom The Bell Tolls.
     Gregorio Fluentes, 97, the first mate of the Pilar is alive and
well, according to Davison, and takes two meals each day at one of
Hemingway's favorite restaurants, La Terraza, which still keeps
"Papa's" favorite chair on the premises.
     Also visiting the Finca Vigia last summer, in what Davison said
proved to be a highly emotional experience, was Gregory Hemingway, 64,
the youngest of the author's three sons.
     "He had not been back to the house since 1951," Davison said. "We
watched him as he looked at a place that he had not seen for nearly 45
years."
     Although in many ways Cuba is a land frozen in time, its streets
lined with American cars from the 1950s, Davison said there is great
excitement in Cuba about present day Hemingway studies.
     The conference paper presented by Davison focused on the items
and documents that comprise the University's Hemingway collection.
     One part of his presentation paid particular attention to The Old
Man And The Sea, and the letters that Hemingway wrote to Life
magazine, which published the complete work in a single issue in early
September 1952.
     "These letters reveal the many concerns that Hemingway had about
his art," Davison said. "He really appreciated the interest shown by
others."
     Another event that interested the Cubans at the conference,
Davison said, was when he shared information on the "Ernest Hemingway
In His Time" exhibition, on display at Morris Library through Dec. 16.
     Besides offering admirers of the author a chance to see movie
posters and first editions of the author's major works, the UD
exhibition makes available to scholars a comprehensive collection of
books, manuscripts and other research materials that help illuminate
Hemingway's writing.
     The core of the University materials is the Cohn Collection,
which includes salesmen's dummy books, photographs, ephemera,
typescripts, proofs, inscribed first editions and personal letters.
According to Davison, it is indispensable to a full understanding of
Hemingway's life and art,
     Acquired in 1985, from the estate of Marguerite Cohn, the items
in the UD collection offer glimpses of the author as a cub reporter
for the Kansas City Star in 1917 and his concern with artistic
integrity.
     Writing to Capt. Louis Cohn on June 24, 1930, Hemingway told his
friend that he could not sign a limited edition of a Hemingway
bibliography that Cohn was preparing, stating that "My only pride is
of a certain artistic and financial integrity."
     "Many people have preconceived notions about Hemingway," Davison
said. "They should look at what he wrote, and the way he used words."
     Davison said that during the last 10 years there has been a
reexamination of the author's work, including the way in which women
are portrayed.
     Because his work was concerned with an exploration of humanity,
regardless of gender, Davison said he feels there is a wide range of
complexity in the author's characters and that the image of Hemingway
as a macho guy is a result of people confusing his life with his
writing.
     "His characters are not tough guys," Davison said. "They are
sensitive individuals in a tough world."
                                                         -Jerry Rhodes