Hemingway's suicide: 50 years gone

Saturday night, before enjoying a few drinks with Bobblehead and his Missus at my complimentary room in the Comfort Suites (that’s another story), I received a text from BO. He had been browsing the internet and stumbled on the fact that Ernest Hemingway had killed himself 50 years ago to the day — July 2, 1961.

“Such a waste,” the text ended, “but he lived how he wanted.”

As an admirer and former worshiper of Hemingway’s talent, I was somewhat awed. I felt it was a momentous occasion that deserved recognition. After a visit to Palwaukee Liquor (a true, California-esque liquor store), I intended to dedicate one of my two oil cans of Fosters to Papa, but forgot all about it.

In college, I once browsed the UI Main Library’s massive periodicals archive and found the Time or Newsweek article covering Hemingway’s suicide. His wife said he had been in a good mood the night before; they sang together as he was getting ready for bed. In the morning he woke before her, went into the kitchen, and put his favorite shotgun to the roof of his mouth (the softest part of ones head). The article described the remains of his head, but I cannot remember what it said. Basically, nothing above his lower jaw was left. He was buried in Ketchum, Idaho, and I have always wanted to visit and piss on his grave.

I do not remember exactly what the situation was, but Hemingway had undergone shock therapy treatment (probably for depression) and found it had destroyed his ability to write. Robbed of his talent and love, he apparently thought he was no longer any good to the world. That was his decision and I respect that. Suicide, though a permanent solution to temporary problems, is an option for us all, and Hemingway decided years before “he would much prefer to kill himself than let Death — ‘that old whore’ — decide for him when his time was up.” He actually practiced killing himself with an unloaded elephant rifle. Sick, huh?

Had he not done it the morning of July 2, 1961, Hemingway would have killed himself at another time. Given his deteriorated state, it is pointless to wonder what could have been. Could he have finished the books that would eventually be published posthumously? Could they have been masterfully revised and wrought the way The Sun Also Rises and For Whom the Bell Tolls were? Perhaps, but probably not. Though cobbled together and published by his widow and whomever else, anything that was lying around unfinished at the time of his death will forever lack his finishing touch.