Want to be a professional writer? Do this first. So sayeth Hemingway, so sayeth I.

[rachel776]

A quick break from tennis.

I can tell you how to become a professional musician, but early this morning I read one part of a famous author's prescription for becoming a writer.

In Hollywood I do come across a shocking number of people thinking they're going to write a hit movie or TV series with no underlying education or training, or even understanding of show business, or literary fiction for that matter. I can tell you from watching many go down in flames, it's a pipe dream; it's folly.

In the 1930s, a 22-year-old graduate named Arnold Samuelson hopped a train from the University of Minnesota to Florida, hoping to talk about writing with Ernest Hemingway.

“A foolish thing to do,” Samuelson said, “but a tramp during the Great Depression didn’t have to have much reason for what he did.”

Hemingway agreed, and let Samuelson stay with him for almost a year, during which time he became the only protégé the author ever had.

One of the first things Hemingway did after the new college graduate got settled in Key West was to give him a list of books, telling him, “if you haven’t read these, you just aren’t educated.”

Here is that list, in Hemingway's own handwriting, and signed, making it a museum piece.

Besides music, I must have had a good education so far. My school made us read several items on that list.

Madam Bovary

Dubliners

Anna Karenina

War and Peace

not The Brothers Karamazov, but they did have us read Crime and Punishment

Wuthering Heights

not The Americans, but Daisy Miller

I will tell you, NOT ONE of these books is part of the curriculum of the LA Public School system, which I think ranks #49 out of the 50 states.

That's all for now. Went to a reception at Raducanu's villa last night where we had some of the most delicious lobster puffs I've ever eaten. We saw her play round 3 this morning, off to watch Mirra Andreeva in about an hour! 🎾

[TheSmellOfVictoria]

I can actually say, I did have to read some of those books. When I was in highschool, American Literature was a required class. I can't say I enjoyed it but I had to get through it if I wanted to graduate! Looking back, I can appreciate it now.

[TheSmellOfVictoria]

I also have to mention, the class wasn't just about novels written by prolific authors, it also involved diaries written by unknown colonists, writing about everyday life. THAT I found incredibly interesting!

[MrChinaski]

This was a super-interesting post, thank you.

My favourite Hemingway quote is: Draft drunk, but edit sober.

[rachel776]

i will find somewhere to use that in life 😁

[MrChinaski]

For those not studying English, but that still love English, Amy Hungerford's Yale English series is still online. I give it five stars. https://oyc.yale.edu/english/engl-291

[Caughtulookin]

I realized from this that i have never read a single Hemingway book. Thats surprising to me because i had to write a 3 page essay on The Scarlett Letter in 7th grade. Not a single one of his books were required reading for myself in school. The majority of the books i was required to read were anti communism dystopian.

[rachel776]

it's like Neil Diamond, there are Hemingway teachers and non-Hemingway teachers

[RingOfFire]

"I will tell you, NOT ONE of these books is part of the curriculum of the LA Public School system, which I think ranks #49 out of the 50 states."

Of course not. You're talking about California.

Why expose children to any of that bourgeois capitalist propaganda when you can have them read "How to Become a Transsexual by age 12," "Why Down is Up and Up is Down," "Make Rich People Pay Your Way," and "I'd Rather Be a Muslim Terrorist, Than a Jew?"

[RingOfFire]

Oh I almost forgot the top of their required reading list for kids.

"Why I Hate America and you Should Too"

[Dongie]

I didn't make it through War and Peace, but I watched most of the movie along with Anna Karrenana, I think.

[Dongie]

I couldn't get into All quiet on the Western Front or A Farewell to Arms. But I much enjoyed the movie of Ernest and his female partner during WWII and the war in Spain before it. I forget her name but they always had Hemingway daiquiris. Then he used his favorite elephant gun to remove a headache.

[rachel776]

@dongie that one is For Whom the Bell Tolls, the book is quite good too

if you have trouble with a book there's nothing wrong with watching a good movie version of it first so you don't go into the book unarmed, maybe not with an elephant gun, but maybe so

[Dongie]

Yeah, that was it. Cary Cooper did a few of his movies. Perhaps Cooper dying pushed him over the edge. I never could figure out why he did that. Or maybe it was doing all the war corresponding.

[rachel776]

@dongie also if you find something dry or dull, try reading some of his more lively short stories such as the collections In Our Time (sometimes called The Nick Adams Stories) or Winner Take Nothing or A Movable Feast which is often quoted

if it must be a novel, the starter ones are usually said to be The Sun Also Rises and The Old Man and the Sea

[Dongie]

*Gary

[Dongie]

Yeah, I forgot. I read the old man and saw the movie with Anthony Quinn. Very good.

[Dongie]

I much enjoyed a number of John Steinbeck. He's a personal favorite.

[Dongie]

Erich Maria Remarque wrote All Quiet on the Western Front. I did not know this, and I wonder why I thought Hemingway wrote it. Perhaps because Cooper did the movie. 🤷‍♂️

[rachel776]

Gary Cooper did A Farewell to Arms but not All Quiet on the Western Front. both are similar stories

[Dongie]

Oh. Well, they were too slow for me as a kid, and I've not tried them again. 😅

[Panthero80]

Rachel, you have the most interesting My Takes. Enjoy the tennis!

[rachel776]

thank u

[molonski2]

Great post , extremely interesting facts.

[rachel776]

[princeofromance]

I have written a few stories in my day.