One True Podcast

Naomi Wood, author of Mrs. Hemingway, shares her one true sentence from a letter Hemingway wrote to friends Gerald and Sara Murphy after the death of their son, Baoth, in 1935. 

Happy New Year from One True Podcast!  We usher in 2023 with our new year's tradition of wondering what Ernest Hemingway was doing one hundred years ago. In 1923, what was Hemingway writing? Where did he live? Who were his friends and enemies? How was his marriage going?  And what was on the horizon? To answer these questions, we turn to his biographer, James M. Hutchisson, emeritus professor at The Citadel and author of Ernest Hemingway: A New Life. Hutchisson describes Hemingway’s trajectory during this year of transition, a young man recuperating from trauma and loss to a striking transformation from poet to journalist to fiction writer on the cusp of greatness. Happy listening and happy 2023! 

We welcome back Suzanne del Gizzo to ring in the season with a discussion of “The Christmas Gift,” Hemingway’s account of his 1954 plane crashes in East Africa. Del Gizzo, editor of The Hemingway Review and widely published scholar, guides us through this extraordinary piece originally written for Look magazine, its role in Hemingway’s self-mythologizing, its examination of his near-death experience, its representation of Mary, and how the article both reveals and obscures what actually happened.  It has been a triumphant 2022 for One True Podcast, so we hope you’ll enjoy unwrapping this gift of an episode. Thank you for listening and supporting the show.

Michael Mewshaw, author of numerous novels and nonfiction works (including Year of the Gun, The Lost Prince, and the forthcoming My Man in Antibes: Getting to Know Graham Greene) shares his one true sentence from Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms.

We are joined by legendary scholar Jackson Bryer, who explains the origins and implications of a notorious concept: the Hemingway code. When the code was introduced in the 1950s by influential scholar Philip Young, what did he intend it to mean? What is a "code hero"? What is a "Hemingway hero"? What did Hemingway mean by “grace under pressure”? Bryer helps us explore the impact and legacy of the code, its relevance today and its limitations, ultimately suggesting how it might enrich our experience of reading Hemingway’s work. We discuss numerous examples from Hemingway's works to discover how frequently the idea of the code appears: The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and The Old Man and the Sea, along with shorter works such as "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber" and "The Gambler, the Nun, and the Radio."

We welcome prolific scholar Don Daiker to help us celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of The Nick Adams Stories. We discuss the volume’s impact and legacy, Philip Young’s controversial editorial decisions, the sequencing, and the characterization of Nick himself, in all of his various phases. Which stories does Daiker consider underrated? Is Dr. Adams unjustly criticized as cold and unloving? What is the role of “The Last Good Country,” the longest story in the volume? Is “Big Two-Hearted River” ultimately affirmative or tragic? We tackle these issues and much, much more as we examine The Nick Adams Stories with its most enthusiastic advocate and its shrewdest analyst.

Joshua Ferris, winner of the PEN/Hemingway Award for his novel Then We Came to the End, joins us to discuss his one true sentence from The Sun Also Rises.

One hundred years ago, in September 1922, Turkish forces torched the port city of Smyrna in a hellish episode towards the end of the Greco-Turkish War. The ensuing evacuation, with its chaos and grisly violence, inspired Hemingway’s journalism as well as his short fiction. Hemingway’s most enduring effort to capture this atrocity is "On the Quai at Smyrna," which would become the first story in his collection In Our Time. This masterpiece of irony with its memorable narrative voice has intrigued readers, even as its historical basis has been less discussed, especially by American readers. To help us penetrate this puzzling narrative, we are joined by Hariclea Zengos, Dean of the School of Arts and Sciences and Professor of English at the American University of Ras Al Khaimah, United Arab Emirates. Prof. Zengos guides us through the tragic historical roots of “On the Quai at Smyrna” as well as the story’s structure, voice, its unforgettable imagery, and its devastating opening and closing lines.

We are asking the entire One True Podcast community to contribute to the Hurricane Ian relief effort. Our production studios are in Fort Myers, Florida, which took the brunt of the storm, so we want to do anything we can to lend a hand. This episode honors the recovery effort by urging our listeners to go to www.communitycooperative.com and give generously to provide direct help to those who suffered from the hurricane. Fittingly, we will devote this One True Fundraiser to a lively discussion of Hemingway’s hardboiled short story, “After the Storm,” set in the aftermath of the devastating hurricane of 1919. A man is choked and another guy gets his arm muscle slashed in just the first paragraph! To sort out all the action, we are joined by our friend and first-ever guest, Kirk Curnutt, who lends his expertise on Hemingway and Key West history and culture.We hope you’ll enjoy the three-way discussion and we also hope you’ll donate to www.communitycooperative.com to help the recovery! Thank you!

Kawai Strong Washburn, winner of the PEN/Hemingway Award for his novel Sharks in the Time of Saviors, joins us to discuss his one true sentence from "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place."