Interview with Nancy Sindelar, Part 2

By Craig Mindrum

In our first conversation with Hemingway scholar Nancy Sindelar—author of a new biography, Hemingway's Passions: His Women, His Wars, and His Writing—we began the exploration of how the many women in his life influenced his writing. We continue here.

Q: Nancy, at the end of your book, you provide an extended discussion of Ernest’s relationship with the famous German-American actress Marlene Dietrich. Tell us more about her.

Nancy: She and Ernest encountered each other on board on the transatlantic liner, Ile de France, in 1934. They became fast friends almost from the moment they met in the ship’s dining room. Only two years older than Dietrich, Ernest nevertheless took on a role that was typical of him---teacher and mentor. Marlene began calling him “Papa”; he called her “the Kraut.”

Later, in an interview with the New York Herald Tribune she called Ernest “the most fascinating man I know.” She said, “if more people had friends like Ernest there would be fewer analysts.” She understood Hemingway’s rules for living and appreciated the various ways in which he put them into action. She called him “the most positive life force I have ever encountered” and believed he found time to do the things most men only dream about.

Q: Did they ever consummate their relationship?

Nancy: All indicators point to “No,” but their friendship survived 27 years, from the time they met until Ernest's death. It was nourished by long-distance phone calls, letters, transatlantic crossings aboard the same ships, dinners at 21 Club in New York, and meetings at the Ritz Hotel in Paris. In a long letter to Dietrich written after finishing his novel, Across the River and into the Trees, Ernest closed with “I love you very much.”

Q: In that same letter, he mentions that he had only been truly in love with five women in his life. This has resulted in speculation by his biographers. What’s your guess?

Nancy: One very safe guess, I think, is Agnes von Kurosky, the nurse who attended him in Italy following his war wounds—and who became the basis for the character of Catherine Barkley in Farewell to Arms. Then I’d add his first wife, Hadley Richardson. She believed in his ability as a writer and encouraged their move to Paris. In A Moveable Feast he later said, “I wish I had died before I loved anyone but her.”

Then there’s Marlene Dietrich herself and perhaps, Adriana Ivancich, the nineteen year old that inspired him to write Across the River and into the Trees. That leaves one opening. Ernest himself would exclude his second wife, Pauline Pfieffer, and his third wife, Martha Gellhorn, from the list. He blamed Pauline for using the “oldest trick” to lure him away from Hadley as she befriended Hadley just to spend time with Ernest. Then he wrote to Marlene that, “I loved Miss Martha I guess but I couldn't stand her.” (She was far too independent for Hemingway’s needs at the time.) That leaves one other wife, Mary. She turned out to be more of a caretaker, and, of course, the executor of his estate. But who really knows for sure? Readers will just have to decide for themselves when they read the book.

Q: Hemingway seems to have been at odds with himself—the desire for a safe and comfortable marriage, at least for a period of time, along with a tendency to not be able to withstand women who set their eye on him (like Pauline Pfeiffer and Martha Gellhorn). Can you say something about this tension?

Nancy: He did indeed have that conflict, because he sincerely wanted to be a faithful husband. He was brought up in a religious household where you had one wife for your entire life. But he also had this tendency of wanting to move on. Often, though, the women came to him, attracted to his masculinity—a hunter, a fisherman, and an adventurous risk-taker. And, when he was young, he also was very handsome.

In a letter written late in his life to his friend F. Scott Fitzgerald, he talked about his version of heaven. It was a place where you have two houses: one where you live with your wife, and it's a monogamous relationship, and you're happy and you're devoted. Then the other house has seven floors, each with a different prostitute on each floor. That story certainly goes a long way toward describing a kind of “sexual turbulence” within him.

Q: Let’s temporarily end our conversation here. Next time I’d like to explore a couple of other things, such as his late-in-life infatuation with Adriana Ivancich, a young woman from Venice nearly 40 years his junior, who became his muse for a time.

Nancy Sindelar, Ph.D., is the author of a new biography, Hemingway's Passions: His Women, His Wars, and His Writing. She is the author of several other books, including Influencing Hemingway: People and Places that Shaped His Life and Work. Nancy sits on the Board of the Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park, which oversees the Hemingway Birthplace Museum.

Craig Mindrum, Ph.D., is a member of the Board of the Ernest Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park. He received his doctorate in an interdisciplinary field of ethics, theology, and literature from the University of Chicago. He is a writer and business consultant.