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Care to be a Successful Writer? Perhaps you should ask Hemingway.
Care to be a Successful Writer? Perhaps you should ask Hemingway.
I have always been told that to be a writer one has to be a reader.

A serious reader Alternatively, one should at least try to spend a little time with a writer of note which really means one whose books are widely read.

Love him or hate him, Hemingway was a serious, disciplined and inspiring writer and I can only hope to emulate his dedication to his craft.

( This might mean shrugging off my addiction to sloth )
It was wonderful therefore to come across Arnold Samuelson's intriguing novel, 'With Hemingway. A year in Key West and Cuba.'

The unpublished manuscript only came to light after his daughter discovered it among his processions after his death in 1981 and thankfully it is now in print.

From here on in, I'll let Mr.
Samuelson tell the story;

In 1934, a 22-year-old aspiring writer named Arnold Samuelson set out to meet his literary hero, hoping to steal a few moments with Hemingway to talk about writing.

Just having completed his coursework in journalism at the University of Minnesota, this son of Norwegian immigrant wheat farmers, refused to pay the $5 diploma fee conveyed on him by the university he made a bold decision.

Convinced that his literary education would be best served by apprenticing himself to one of the 'best' writers of the time, Ernest Hemingway, he climbed aboard a coal car in Minnesota and 'road the rails' all the way to Key West.

"It seemed a damn fool thing to do," Samuelson later recalled, "but a twenty-two-year-old tramp during the Great Depression didn't have to have much reason for what he did." Unreasonable though the quest may have been, he ended up staying with Hemingway for almost an entire year, over the course of which he became the literary titan's only true protégé.

Samuelson recorded the experience and its multitude of learnings in a manuscript that was only discovered by his daughter after his death in 1981.

It was eventually published as With Hemingway:

A Year in Key West and Cuba — the closest thing to a psychological profile of the great writer.

Shortly after the young man's arrival in Key West, Hemingway got right down to granting him what he had travelled there seeking.

In one of their first exchanges, he hands Samuelson a handwritten list and instructs him:

Blogging Blog Paul Care to be a Successful Writer? Perhaps you should ask Hemingway. Care to be a Successful Writer? Perhaps you should ask Hemingway.
I have always been told that to be a writer one has to be a reader.

A serious reader Alternatively, one should at least try to spend a little time with a writer of note which really means one whose books are widely read.

Love him or hate him, Hemingway was a serious, disciplined and inspiring writer and I can only hope to emulate his dedication to his craft.

( This might mean shrugging off my addiction to sloth )
It was wonderful therefore to come across Arnold Samuelson's intriguing novel, 'With Hemingway. A year in Key West and Cuba.'
Ernest Hemmingway

The unpublished manuscript only came to light after his daughter discovered it among his processions after his death in 1981 and thankfully it is now in print.

From here on in, I'll let Mr.
Samuelson tell the story;

In 1934, a 22-year-old aspiring writer named Arnold Samuelson set out to meet his literary hero, hoping to steal a few moments with Hemingway to talk about writing.

Just having completed his coursework in journalism at the University of Minnesota, this son of Norwegian immigrant wheat farmers, refused to pay the $5 diploma fee conveyed on him by the university he made a bold decision.

Convinced that his literary education would be best served by apprenticing himself to one of the 'best' writers of the time, Ernest Hemingway, he climbed aboard a coal car in Minnesota and 'road the rails' all the way to Key West.

"It seemed a damn fool thing to do," Samuelson later recalled, "but a twenty-two-year-old tramp during the Great Depression didn't have to have much reason for what he did." Unreasonable though the quest may have been, he ended up staying with Hemingway for almost an entire year, over the course of which he became the literary titan's only true protégé.

Samuelson recorded the experience and its multitude of learnings in a manuscript that was only discovered by his daughter after his death in 1981.

It was eventually published as With Hemingway:

A Year in Key West and Cuba — the closest thing to a psychological profile of the great writer.

Shortly after the young man's arrival in Key West, Hemingway got right down to granting him what he had travelled there seeking.

In one of their first exchanges, he hands Samuelson a handwritten list and instructs him:

Somerset Maugham Here's a list of books any writer should have read as a part of his education... If you haven't read these, you just aren't educated. They represent different types of writing.

Some may bore you, others might inspire you and others are so beautifully written they'll make you feel it's hopeless for you to try to write.

This is the list of heartening and hopeless-making masterworks that Hemingway handed to young Samuelson:
1. The Blue Hotel by Stephen Crane
2. The Open Boat by Stephen Crane
3. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
4. Dubliners by James Joyce
5. The Red and the Black by Stendhal
6. Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham
7. Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
8. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
9. Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann
10. Hail and Farewell ) by George Moore
11. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
12. The Oxford Book of English Verse
13. The Enormous Room by E.E. Cummings
14. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
15. Far Away and Long Ago by W.H. Hudson
16. The American by Henry James
Alongside the list of heavy tomes, Hemingway offered young Samuelson some concrete writing advice.

He advocated what psychologists now call flow , or as he put it, "staying with the script" He went on to explain the psychological discipline of the writing process:

Gustav Flaubert. "The most important thing I've learned about writingis never to write too much at a time... Never pump yourself dry. Leave a little for the next day. The main thing is to know when to stop. Don't wait till you've written yourself out.

When you're still going good and you come to an interesting place and you know what's going to happen next, that's the time to stop.

Then leave it alone and don't think about it; let your subconscious mind do the work."
He continues;
"The next morning, when you've had a good sleep and you're feeling fresh, rewrite what you wrote the day before. When you come to the interesting place and you know what is going to happen next, go on from there and stop at another high point of interest. That way, when you get through, your stuff is full of interesting places and when you write a novel you never get stuck and you make it interesting as you go along. Every day go back to the beginning and rewrite the whole thing and when it gets too long, read at least two or three chapters before you start to write and at least once a week go back to the start. That way you make it one piece. And when you go over it, cut out everything you can. The main thing is to know what to leave out. The way you tell whether you're going good is by what you can throw away. If you can throw away stuff that would make a high point of interest in somebody else's story, you know you're going good."
. ee Cummings. Later to say he imparted some wise words to the eager Samuelson;
"Sometimes you can go on writing for years before it shows. If a man's got it in him, it will come out sometime. The only thing I can advise you is to keep on writing but it's a damned tough racket. The only reason I make any money at it is I'm a sort of literary pirate. Out of every ten stories I write, only one is any good and I throw the other nine away".
Hemingway tempers this with a word of advice on ambition, self-comparison, and originality:
Stephen Crane "Never compete with living writers. You don't know whether they're good or not. Compete with the dead ones you know are good. Then when you can pass them up you know you're going good.

You should have read all the good stuff so that you know what has been done because if you have a story as one somebody else has written, yours isn't any good unless you can write a better one.

In any art, you're allowed to steal anything if you can make it better, but the tendency should always be upward instead of down.

And don't ever imitate anybody. All style is, is the awkwardness of a writer in stating a fact.

If you have a way of your own, you are fortunate, but if you try to write like somebody else, you'll have the awkwardness of the other writer as well as your own.

"
Makes sense really wouldn't you say?

Paul v Walters is a best selling writer of several novels and when he is not cocooned in sloth and procrastination in his house in Bali, he occasionally stirs to scribble for several international travel and vox pop journals.

#Stephen Crane #Key West #Hemingway #Successful Writer #Samuelson Phil Friedman
5 tahun yang lalu #27
#31

Cyndi wilkins Cyndi, you will forgive me if I find the defenders of plagiarism and the mis-construers of this particular comment by Hemingway tedious.

The fact is plagiarism is the use of another's work without attribution or credit being given to the original author and while presenting it as one's own original work.

That is not what Hemingway meant to encourage when he talks about "stealing". Nor is what Hemingway is talking about the same as that which those who deplore plagiarism are talking about. Paul, how do you think Hemingway would have faired on Social Media. Would he have thrived on the emoticons and the point-and-click likes or...

would they have driven him to put the shotgun into his mouth and pull the trigger decades earlier than he did? I think the great thing about Hemingway was not that he was a great writer because he only wrote at that level a few distinct times during his life but that unlike the hoi polloi, he knew great writing for what it is and was brutally honest with himself when he didn't and couldn't anymore rise to that level.

Interesting piece. Thanks and cheers Cyndi wilkins
5 tahun yang lalu #26
"

In any art, you're allowed to steal anything if you can make it better, but the tendency should always be upward instead of down.

" Hmm Paul Walters 's all kinds of spouting about plagiarism on these platforms...I wonder... What would they say to Hemingway? My favorite on 'the list' by far is Wuthering Heights...That story has haunted me for years. Not that I have read any of the other ones. I think I made an attempt at War and Peace but found it a 'snorefest'... I guess I would be uneducated by his standards,..However, I do like his bottom line..."Keep on if it never shows...It's a tough racket;-)" Joyce Bowen Brand Ambassador @ beBee
5 tahun yang lalu #24
Geethis is such good advice, I had to print it out. Blech. I've always hated Hemmingway. I bought a few of his books regardless. I've been searching for a reason to look at him with newfound eyes. By goshwhat a gift you've given me. Thanks Paul Walters Ken Boddie
5 tahun yang lalu #22
#25
not sure, Prav. I'm sometimes also missing these plus/minus thingamies on my comments. I usually access beBee on my iPhone. How about you? I hear that the iPhone version of beBee has some glitches. Ken Boddie
5 tahun yang lalu #21
#22
I suspect, Paul, that in Nîmes he might rather have been drinking his infamous 'death in the afternoon'. Paul Walters
5 tahun yang lalu #19
#6
Ken Boddie Ah to have slept in the same room as the master... did it smell of whiskey ? Paul Walters
5 tahun yang lalu #16
#10
Ian Weinberg never too late MR Weinberg although I suspect that you have read more than all the bees combined Paul Walters
5 tahun yang lalu #15
#13
Jerry Fletcher He was such a modest fellow....I think not. Wonder did he even read the tomes he quoted. Paul Walters
5 tahun yang lalu #13
#15
CityVP \ud83d\udc1d Manjit Ah have a giant treat ahead of you. Thanks for stopping by CityVP Manjit
5 tahun yang lalu #12

Hemingway and Joyce are writers that I have heard a lot about, but I have not yet read a single paragraph of their actual work.

That will come over time, because this year, I have finally begun to read non-fiction books - having read two this year, which surpasses what I have managed to read for donkey's of years.

So while fiction may still not be on my radar in the short-term, with my current reading progress (as a non-fiction reader), I am sure that is the next big milestone moment in my slow transformation to becoming a reader.

Writing clearly is not a problem for me, but reading is the actual learning opportunity. John Rylance
5 tahun yang lalu #11
I came across this quote by Benjamin Disraeli, when visiting his home at Hughenden Manor. If I wanted to read a novel, I would write one. Jerry Fletcher
5 tahun yang lalu #10
Paul, Very interesting.

Some of the language, the turning of phrases and the sheer length of the cited works continue to give me pause.

I admire the variance of style but few of the suggestions (save Joyce) stir passions in me. The list is, after all, Hemingway's choices but includes not one of his own works. And so it goes. Ali Anani
5 tahun yang lalu #9
"The main thing is to know when to stop. Don't wait till you've written yourself out" This is a post for all writers by the distinguished Paul Walters . I admit Pail that I have read only 30% of the suggested books. Debasish Majumder
5 tahun yang lalu #8
lovely buzz Paul Walters enjoyed read and shared. thank you very much for the buzz. Ian Weinberg
5 tahun yang lalu #7
Aw shucks Paul Walters I came to terms with the fact that I wasn't a writer. Now I have to live with the fact that I'm not a reader either. Harvey Lloyd
5 tahun yang lalu #6
The art of transferring through words, spoken or written, a feeling, mystery or paradigm is a daunting task. You do quite well in this task. Reading enhances and broadens our ability to share a journey with words. Through reading we learn many ways of communicating nebulous thoughts we have in our experiences. Through reading i learn what many great people did to communicate forward to the future, ideals. Not facts, not law or knowledge but their conceiving argument of why an ideal should be treated with grace. Great thoughts. Ken Boddie
5 tahun yang lalu #5
It appears that I accidentally deleted my earlier comment, so here goes again.

If being "educated" means reading the doorstops of Tolstoy, etc, then I guess I'm illiterate, incompetent, ignorant, or whatever the antonym is of educated.

But please, Pak Paul, feel free to disagree.

Incidentally, my better half and I checked into a hotel in Nîmes in the South of France a few years back.

When we got to our room on the top floor it had "Hemingway Suite" on the door (although the term 'suite' was a bit of overkill).

It appears that our wordsmith spent a bit of time in the area and there were pictures of him throughout the establishment.

Go figure. Pascal Derrien
5 tahun yang lalu #4
I quite like Hemingway short nervous and to the point style Ken Boddie
5 tahun yang lalu #2
Ah well then, Pak Paul, I guess I'm just not edjimikated. If being "well educated" means having read Tolstoy, etc, then I must be uncultured, illiterate and ignorant. Of course, I won't be too upset if you disagree.

Incidentally my better half and I checked into a hotel in Nîmes, in the South of France, a few years back, and when we got to our room on the top floor, lo and behold, it had "Hemmingway Suite" on the door (although calling it a suite was a bit over the top).

It transpires the old wordsmith spent a bit of time there, as also evident by his pictures throughout the building.

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Neurosurgeon and neuromodulator (neuro-coach).
Strategy, human behavior and complexity management
I am a dedicated and avid investigative researcher
Salem - Massachusetts
RS Columbia Asia BSD Tangerang, Indonesia
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