A Reminder of the Sad Final Decline
A review of the Audible Audio edition narrated by P.J. Ochlan

Relatively speaking, the material about the platonic friendship between writer Ernest Hemingway and his younger-by-30-years muse Adriana Ivancich is probably only about 15-20% of this book. A great deal of time is spent on summarizing such things as Hemingway's previous travels to Italy and about life in America & Cuba and the perilous final African safari with 2 plane crashes of early 1954.

49-year-old Hemingway met the then 18-year-old Ivancich while on a duck hunting trip to Venice in 1948. His infatuation became quite obsessive, even though it was mostly always chaperoned by her mother or her girlfriend. The relationship that couldn't be realized in real-life became a fantasy created in his final novel published in his lifetime "Across the River and Into the Trees" (1950). The cringe-worthy love story and writing was almost universally panned and was the subject of a savage parody in "Across the Street and Into the Grill" (The New Yorker Oct. 14, 1950) by E.B. White with his own (possibly alcohol influenced) befuddledness observed in "How Do You Like It Now, Gentlemen?" (The New Yorker May 13, 1950) by Lillian Ross.

Despite the failure of the novel, Hemingway pushed on to write the novella "The Old Man and the Sea" (1952), supposedly to redeem himself in the eyes of his muse during a 3-month period in late 1951/early 1952 that she spent in Cuba with her mother and brother as guests of the Hemingways. During that time, he worked in the white tower extension of the Hemingway's Finca Vigia home in Cuba where Adriana had a separate room to work on her painting and poetry. Adriana's own memoir of that time "La torre bianca" (The White Tower) (1980) is occasionally quoted here, as is wife Mary Hemingway's memoir "How It Was" (1976). Understandably, Mary is bitter about the pain and embarrassment brought on by the extra-marital relationship. Adriana is always well-meaning about Mary though and apparently regularly spoke up on her behalf to Hemingway himself.

That final flowering in the novella did help him to secure the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 and the Nobel Prize in 1954. All other works from the last 2 decades have had to be shaped by editors before obtaining posthumous release.

Journalist and historian Andrea di Robilant has a familial tie-in to the story as his relative Carlo di Robilant was one of Hemingway's Venetian cronies who is occasionally mentioned in this book. The book here is well done, but it is still ultimately a sad reminder of the writer's decline and the final tragedies that were yet to come for everyone (no spoilers here). ( )

After World War II, Ernest Hemingway was in a funk. He was depressed, had writer's block and seems to be regretting marrying his 4th wife Mary Welsh. In an attempt to cheer him up,Mary organizes a motoring tour of the south of France and Italy and in Venice Hemingway met the love 18-year old Adriana who was his muse for his largely regrettable novel Across the River and Into the Trees

It's debatable whether or not Hemingway actually had a sexual relationship with Adriana, but he was clearly smitten and there was a voluminous correspondence between the two with lots of "Papa" and "daughter" blather. (And how did anyone take this blatantly Freudian dialogue seriously?) And why did Mary Welsh stick around? Was she that desperate to be close to fame?

In the end, Hemingway left Adriana's reputation ruined in Venice and like him, she ended her life in suicide. This was just a sad story all around. ( )

Well researched and very interesting for a reader interested in the later years of Hemingway's life as well as his penning The Old Man and the Sea. Initially at times I was bogged-down at points by too many and what I felt were unnecessary details, but, I admit sheepishly, I began skimming such chunks to move forward in the reading which, in sum, was reading time well spent. ( )