"The Snows of Kilimanjaro" (Ernest Hemingway)

The story opens with a paragraph about Mt. Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa, which is also called
the House of God. There is, we are told, the frozen carcass of a leopard near the summit. No one knows
why it is there.
Then we are introduced to Harry, a writer dying of gangrene, and his rich wife Helen, who are on safari in
Africa. Harrys situation makes him irritable, and he speaks about his own death in a matter-of-fact way that
upsets his wife, predicting that a rescue plane will never come. He quarrels with her over everything, from
whether he should drink a whiskey-and-soda to whether she should read to him. Helen is obviously
concerned for his welfare, but self-pity and frustration make him unpleasant to her.
He then begins to ruminate on his life experiences, which have been many and varied, and on the fact that he
feels he has never reached his potential as a writer because he has chosen to make his living by marrying a
series of wealthy women. In italicized portions of the text that are scattered throughout the story,
Hemingway narrates some of Harrys experiences in a stream-of-consciousness style.
Harrys first memories are of traveling around Europe following a battle, hiding a deserter in a cottage,
hunting and skiing in the mountains, playing cards during a blizzard, and hearing about a bombing run on a
train full of Austrian officers.
Harry then falls asleep and wakes in the evening to find Helen returning from a shooting expedition. He
meditates on how she is really thoughtful and a good wife to him, but how his life has been spent marrying a
series of women who keep him as a proud possession and neglecting his true talent, writing. Helen, he
remembers, is a rich widow who was bored by the series of lovers she took before she met him and who
married him because she admired his writing and they had similar interests.
Harry then recalls the process by which he developed gangrene two weeks before: he had been trying to get
a picture of some water-buck and had scratched his knee on a thorn. He had not used iodine and it had
become septic. As Helen returns to drink cocktails with Harry, they make up their quarrel.
Harrys second memory sequence then begins, and he recalls how he once patronized a series of prostitutes
in Constantinople while pining for a woman in New York. Specifically, he had a fight with a British soldier
over an Armenian prostitute and then left Constantinople for Anatolia, where he ran from an army of Turkish
soldiers. Later, he recalls that he returned to Paris and to his then-wife.
Helen and Harry eat dinner, and then Harry has another memory, this time of how his grandfathers log
house burned down. He then relates how he fished in the Black Forest and how he lived in a poor quarter of
Paris and felt a kinship with his neighbors because they were poor. Next, he remembers a ranch and a boy he
turned in to the authorities after the boy protected Harrys horse feed by shooting a thief. Next, he
remembers an officer named Williamson who was hit by a bomb and to whom Harry subsequently fed all his
morphine tablets.
As Harry lies on his cot remembering, he feels the presence of death and associates it with a hyena that is
running around the edge of the campsite. Presently, Helen has Harrys cot moved into the tent for the night,
and just as she does, he feels death lying on his chest and is unable to speak.
Harry dreams that it is the next morning and that a man called Compton has come with a plane to rescue
him. He is lifted onto the plane and watches the landscape go by beneath him. Suddenly, he sees the snowcovered top of Mt. Kilimanjaro and knows that is where he is bound.
Helen wakes up in the middle of the night to a strange hyena cry and sees Harry dead on his cot.
ANALYSIS
This story focuses on the self-critical ruminations and memories of a writer dying of a preventable case of
gangrene on safari. Its main themes are death and regret, and Harrys morbid thoughts epitomize a classic
case of taking things for granted. Harry takes his blessings, including his caring wife, his full life, and his
writing talent, for granted, and on his deathbed muses on how he could have appreciated each more. His
main regret, of course, is that he has not reached his full potential as a writer because he has chosen to make
a living by marrying wealthy women rather than memorializing his many and varied life experiences in
writing. The progression of his gangrene symbolizes his rotting sense of self-worth.
This last regret is made so bitter to Harry because, as he admits, it is his own fault he has not adequately
exercised his great talent: He had destroyed his talent by not using it, by betrayals of himself and what he
believed in. In a strange parallel, it is also Harrys fault that he developed gangrene; by not using iodine on
his scratch, he allowed it to become septic and is therefore to blame for his impending death.
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Viewed in this light, Harrys predicament is self-inflicted, and is therefore a fitting punishment for his
repeated acts of self-betrayal over the years. The lingering question of the story is how Harrys situation is
resolved by the dream sequence that ends the narration. Does his journey to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro
symbolize Harrys acceptance of his punishment and acquiescent passage into the afterlife, or does it stand
for Harrys redemption as a character and continuing desire to rise above his past mistakes, even at the
moment of his death? What does Kilimanjaro stand for?
There is abundant symbolism in this story, as many scholars have noted. The actual significance and
meaning of these symbols has been hotly debated, but generally, the frozen leopard on the summit of
Kilimanjaro is associated with death, immortality, and possibly redemption. The hyena and vultures are
associated with illness, fear, and death, and Kilimanjaro itself, though its role has sparked the most
controversy among scholars and critics, seems associated with a sort of redemptive heavenly afterlife. In
addition, throughout the story, low-lying, hot plains areas are associated with difficult or painful episodes in
Harrys life, including the situation in which he begins the story, and snowy mountainous areas are
associated with his happier, more uplifting experiences, including his final imagined ascent to the top of
Kilimanjaro. In addition, gangrene, the rotting of the flesh, is symbolic of Harrys rotting soul.
In terms of style, Hemingway narrates the sequences between Harry and Helen in a straightforward third
person format and breaks into italicized stream-of-consciousness for Harrys many memory sequences.
These memories are often conveyed using run-on sentences and consist of bewildering pastiches of
characters, places, and events which are consistent with Harrys delirium. According to Hemingway
scholars, these memories are mostly autobiographical. Using Harry as a vehicle, Hemingway writes of a log
house he visited as a child in Michigan, of his experiences during World War I, of his life in Paris with his
first wife and their fishing trip to the Black Forest, of his skiing trips in Austria, and of a location near the
Yellowstone River in Wyoming.
Harry, as a character, produces similes and metaphors with regularity as he speaks to Helen (Love is a
dunghillAnd Im the cock that gets on it to crow; Your damned money was my armour). This is also
true during his memory sequences (the snow as smooth to see as cake frosting and as light as powder and
he remembered the noiseless rush the speed made as you dropped down like a bird; in some way he could
work the fat off his soul the way a fighter went into the mountains to work and train in order to burn it out of
his body).
"The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber" (Ernest Hemingway)
Hemingway introduces the three principal characters, Francis Macomber, his wife Margot, and their safari
guide Richard Wilson, over cocktails in the afternoon on the African plain following a morning of hunting.
Macomber and his wife are wealthy Americans hoping to revitalize their sometimes-foundering marriage
with a romantic African safari and Wilson is a jaded Englishman who runs safaris for wealthy tourists for a
living. As the three drink gimlets, they dance around the topic of Macombers display of cowardice earlier
that day as he ran away from a wounded lion and left Wilson to shoot it.
As Macomber becomes apologetic toward Wilson, Margot loses her composure and runs off to cry out of
shame on her husbands behalf. Macomber expresses his embarrassment to Wilson once more and asks
Wilson not to mention his cowardice to mutual acquaintances. This is too much for Wilson, who insults
Macomber in an attempt to estrange himself from husband and wife and set up an atmosphere of
professional coolness for the remainder of the safari. Macomber is too friendly, however, and Wilson ends
up both liking and pitying him.
Margot returns to the table and begins a campaign of bitchery against her husband, referring obliquely and
ironically to the topics of fear, lions, and hunting both to needle Macomber and impress Wilson. Wilsons
sympathy for Macomber deepens.
In the late afternoon, Macomber and Wilson go off together and shoot impala while Margot stays behind in
camp looking, as Wilson puts it, like an English rose (though she is American). Macomber successfully
shoots an impala.
That night after dinner, Macomber lies in his bunk and meditates on his loss of confidence and the
cowardice that replaced his self-assurance. He relives the incident beginning with his attempt at sleep 24
hours earlier, which was when he first heard the roaring of the lion and became afraid of it. The day of the
incident, he discussed shooting the lion with Wilson over breakfast, then the three drove off in a car to find
it. Once it appeared, Wilson encouraged Macomber to get out and shoot it, which he did, alone, after
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hesitating and missing a good shot. Gut-shot, the lion slunk into the bush and Wilson announced they were
going in after it to finish it off. Macomber, terrified but unable to appear so, accompanied Wilson into the
bush and promptly ran when the wounded lion leaped at him. Wilson shot it and Margot witnessed the whole
incident from the car. When the men return to the car, Margot kisses Wilson.
Macomber also meditates on the fact that his marriage had been on the rocks before but that he was sure his
wife would not leave him because he was too rich. He was equally sure he would never leave her because
she was too beautiful. He then falls asleep, waking to find his wife gone. After two hours, Margot returns to
the tent and it becomes clear that she has slept with Wilson. She refuses to discuss the matter with
Macomber.
The next morning, the atmosphere is strained. Wilson absolves himself of blame by mentally rubbishing
Macomber and explaining to the reader that he sleeps with many of the wives of his clients, who feel that
they are not getting their moneys worth unless they share his cot at some point during the expedition.
Presently, husband, wife, and guide start off in the car in search of buffalo. They find three and chase them
in their car. Macomber and Wilson fire a volley of shots and bring down all three. The chase and the
shootings are fast-paced and exciting, and leave Macomber with a sense of elation and a new confidence,
which Wilson likens to a coming of age. Margot is clearly uneasy about this development, which seems to
foreshadow a power shift in her relationship with her husband.
One of the gun-bearers then comes limping up to the car to announce that the first buffalo Macomber shot
was not killed but wounded, and has crawled off into the brush. The car is driven back to the shooting site,
and Macomber and Wilson walk into the brush in search of the buffalo, which charges Macomber.
Macomber stands his ground in front of the charging animal and both he and Wilson shoot it. As it is about
to hit Macomber, Margot fires from the car, shooting Macomber in the back of the head and killing him.
Wilson sarcastically assures Margot that she will not be convicted of her husbands murder, though he says
Macomber would have left you too. Margot is hysterical, and it is left unclear whether she hit her husband
accidentally or is a cold-blooded murderess.
ANALYSIS
Hemingways themes in this story are masculinity and its foil, cowardice, and the coming of age that is
possible through exposure to nature and by overcoming the challenges of the great outdoors. Francis
Macomber is described as a handsome man who is good at court games and had a number of big-game
fishing records, and whose safari clothes are, significantly, new. He is a typical international jet setter
who lives in a suburban or perhaps big-city setting and has had no real exposure to a raw, unadulterated
natural environment, though he is considered athletic. As such, Hemingway portrays him as weak,
subservient to his wife, cowardly and frustrated. Once he conquers his fears and guns down three buffalo, he
becomes empowered, emboldened, and elated. By conquering nature, he has become a man. As Robert
Wilson puts it, It had taken a strange chance of hunting, a sudden precipitation into action without worrying
beforehand, to bring this about with MacomberFear gone like an operation. Something else grew in its
place. Main thing a man had. Made him into a man. Women knew it too. No bloody fear.
Hemingway was a great believer in the power of nature to improve ones quality of life. He was a lifelong
outdoorsman; he went hunting, fishing, camping, and boating in places as diverse as Europe, the Caribbean,
the United States, and Africa. In fact, he wrote this short story following a 10-week safari in East Africa.
This story summarizes the importance Hemingway placed on outdoor activities, especially for men. The
character of Macomber comes into his own masculinity through a few seconds of shooting buffalo; the
activity of hunting not only provides entertainment, excitement, and physical fitness, but it completely
transforms his character and revolutionizes his relationships with others.
Hemingways masculine ideal in this story seems to be Wilson, the white hunter who lives, works, shoots,
and kills in the great outdoors, and whose stock-in-trade is ruggedness and physical courage. Margot and the
reader are invited to compare Macomber to Wilson, and certainly, Wilson comes out on top in that
comparison. However, at the end of the story Wilson breaks the code he purports to live by as he hunts down
buffalo in a car, a certainly unsportsmanlike, possibly cowardly, and indisputably illegal act. Wilson may be
a paragon of manly virtues after the Hemingway school of masculinity, but he is by no means perfect.
Macomber emphasizes masculinity not only by contrast to cowardice but also to femininity, specifically
through the character of Margot, who is central to the storys plot. Hemingways treatment of women in his
fiction has long been, and continues to be, the subject of debate among critics. The accepted wisdom is that
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Hemingway was a chauvinist and possibly a misogynist; women in his stories are obstacles to their male
counterparts rather than positive contributors to the action. Many critics have challenged this view, arguing
that Hemingways portrayal of women is more nuanced and his general attitude more complex than the
traditional view suggests.
There is little debate, however, that Margot Macomber is one of Hemingways bitch goddess characters;
she is grasping, cruel, contemptible, unfaithful, opportunistic, and possibly murderous. In general,
Hemingway treats Margot as a necessary evil in this story, as an inconvenient but essential component of the
existence of his male characters. Wilson calls women a nuisance on safari, and indeed, Margots only
function in this story is to drive Wilson and Macomber apart in spite of their often-mutual desire to be
friendly or at least cordial with each other. In addition, Wilson makes a number of sweeping and unflattering
generalizations about American women of the jet set using Margot as a case study. In spite of his attraction
to her, he calls her enameled in that American female cruelty and refers to her sarcasm at Macombers
expense after the lion incident damn terrorism. Margot is portrayed as a thorough harpy; her only
redeeming quality appears to be her beauty, as Wilson recognizes the morning after he sleeps with her. As
for Macomber, he considers Margots beauty to be the only thing that gives her value; it is the only reason he
married her and the only reason he will never leave her. He recognizes that His wife had been a great
beauty and she was still a great beauty in Africa, but she was not a great enough beauty any more at home to
be able to leave him and better herself and she knew it and he knew it. Margots beauty is her only stock-intrade.
The lingering question of the story, of course, is whether Margot felt threatened enough by Macombers
emancipation to murder him at the end, or whether she was merely trying to kill the buffalo. Scholars have
come down on both sides of the question. The traditional reading of the story teaches that Margot is a
thoroughly grasping and cruel character who shoots to kill, but more revisionist interpretations point out
that, when she pulls the trigger, it is unnecessary for her to be shooting to kill her husband because the
buffalo will run him down in a few seconds anyway. In addition, the accusations of murder that Wilson
levels at her may be motivated by a desire to blackmail her into silence about the fact that he hunted the
buffalo from a car, an illegal practice. According to many scholars, Hemingway himself used to hint that
Macombers death was murder.
Another lingering question among Hemingway scholars is whether Macomber and Margot are modeled on
F. Scott Fitzgerald and his wife Zelda. Fitzgerald was a friend-turned-bitter-rival of Hemingways and some
critics argue that Hemingway created Macomber as an incarnation of all the qualities Hemingway most
disliked in his nemesis. Hemingway certainly mentioned Fitzgerald by name in some of his other stories.
Proponents of this theory point to the fact that Hemingway chose to name Macomber Francis, which was
also Fitzgeralds first name. However, critics point out that this choice was more likely a reference to Francis
Feeble, a character in Shakespeares play Henry IV who served as the original speaker of the quotation
Wilson offers about death toward the end of the story.
The narration of this story is in the third person with an omniscient narrator; Hemingway tells the story from
the points of view of Macomber, Wilson, Margot and the lion from which Macomber flees. As the plot is
driven by interpersonal relationships, this technique is effective at revealing each characters motivations
and the reasons for their behavior. The points of view most often adopted by the narrator are Macombers
and Wilsons, a trend that is consistent with Hemingways marginalization of Margot.
Two literary techniques are in play throughout the story that enliven the action and embellish Hemingways
otherwise minimal descriptive passages. The first is onomatopoeia, and is best exemplified by whunk, the
noise Macombers bullet makes as it hits the lion (p. 22, 33), and carawong, the noise Wilsons highvelocity big gun makes as it fires at game (p. 26, 34). Hemingways usage of these terms helps the reader
imagine the noises and brutality of the hunt.
The second technique Hemingway employs is simile and metaphor. The most notable example occurs in
Wilsons thoughts when Macomber suggests they leave the wounded lion: Robert Wilson, whose entire
occupation had been with the lion and the problem he presented, and who had not been thinking about
Macomber except to note that he was rather windy, suddenly felt as though he had opened the wrong door in
a hotel and seen something shameful (p. 24). This simile demonstrates Wilsons shock at hearing
Macomber voice such cowardly sentiments; Macomber would rather leave the lion to suffer or risk someone
else running into the lion and possibly being killed than face up to hunting it down and finishing what he
started.
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One of the most prominent metaphors in the story is soon after this passage and describes the appearance of
the gun-bearers who have to accompany Macomber and Wilson into the brush to search for the wounded
lion: [Wilson] spoke in Swahili to the two gun-bearers who looked the picture of gloom (p. 25).
The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber is a story about one mans coming of age with the help of
the African flatlands, a rifle, and a friendship with another man, and about how his emancipation was
possibly forestalled by a selfish wife.