Ernest "Papa" Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway

"All my life I've looked at words as though I were seeing them for the first time."
(Ernest Hemingway)

I'm not sure that's anything to brag about. I mean, people suffering dementia can say the same.

That said, I like Ernest Hemingway's writing style - clean, efficient, sparse with words.

What I like most is that he's a good story teller in, "A Farewell to Arms," "The Old Man and the Sea" and "The Snows of Kilimanjaro," and other stories.

I DON'T think that his penchant for cutting down on words is, in and of itself, "art." It's a style...his own unique style. Most who've sought to replicate it, have failed to find success, mostly because they've failed to tell good stories.

Just as Mozart said, "A symphony takes as many notes as it takes," a story takes as many words as it takes.

Once Hemingway challenged others to "Tell a story in as few words as possible." He claimed the best offering was just 6 words, "Unworn baby shoes for sale...cheap."

His point was that a story should be like an iceberg, with 90% of it unseen.

The above six words aren't a story, just a brief sentence, expressing lament. The story is in the details...always in the details, sights, sounds, smells, words that put the reader in place.

The best of Hemingway's stories do that.