The Mailer Review/Volume 5, 2011/Hemingway and Women at the Front: Blowing Bridges in The Fifth Column, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and Other Works: Difference between revisions

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 Jane and Annabelle find it a minor irritant that everyone assumes they must inevitably be nurses. “No, I’m not a nurse,” Jane patiently repeats.{{sfn|Gellhorn and Cowles|1995|p=16}} But this correction implies criticism of the stereotype alone, not the role itself. Indeed, Jane forgoes a scoop in order to render medical aid to a wounded officer on the battlefield, just as Gellhorn helped the medical staff with the wounded on the hospital transport ship where she had stowed away {{pg|398|399}} in the toilet so as to get to Normandy to report on the D-Day landing. Even the “repugnant” Daphne is recuperated.{{sfn|Gellhorn and Cowles|1995|p=36}} When Philip criticizes Daphne because “all she can think about is her dreadful career,” Jane responds with exquisite irony that “it isn’t the career that’s silly,” and she notes with admiration that Daphne “certainly knows what she wants.”{{sfn|Gellhorn and Cowles|1995|p=63}}
-Jane briefly thinks that what she herself wants is marriage to Philip, who suddenly expresses admiration for her independence and professionalism as a war correspondent. But soon he says, “I can’t have you going to the front any more. . . [because] you’re mine now.”{{sfn|Gellhorn and Cowles|1995|p=60}} He sabotages her work by arranging for her to sleep through an attack she is to report, and he makes plans to send her to his family home in England. This last is too much for Jane. She is appalled by his description of the life his mother and sister lead there—notably, not because she finds it trivial, but rather because the riding and hunting, the bee-keeping and cow-tending, the war committees and the uniformed “land army” all require a different sort of courage and a different set of talents than she possesses (76). She is horrified to discover, for example, that there are no “field dressing station[s]” at fox hunts, and she bewails the fact that “there’s no one to pick up the wounded” (69, 64). Imagining a future where she will be “kicked by horses and stung by bees and finally die of mastitis from a cow,” she envies Annabelle whom she envisions “in a lovely dry dug-out somewhere” (73, 69). Jane changes her mind about marrying Philip and lights out for the territory—to Burma, in fact, with Annabelle, to report on the war front there.
+Jane briefly thinks that what she herself wants is marriage to Philip, who suddenly expresses admiration for her independence and professionalism as a war correspondent. But soon he says, “I can’t have you going to the front any more. . . [because] you’re mine now.”{{sfn|Gellhorn and Cowles|1995|p=60}} He sabotages her work by arranging for her to sleep through an attack she is to report, and he makes plans to send her to his family home in England. This last is too much for Jane. She is appalled by his description of the life his mother and sister lead there—notably, not because she finds it trivial, but rather because the riding and hunting, the bee-keeping and cow-tending, the war committees and the uniformed “land army” all require a different sort of courage and a different set of talents than she possesses.{{sfn|Gellhorn and Cowles|1995|p=76}} She is horrified to discover, for example, that there are no “field dressing station[s]” at fox hunts, and she bewails the fact that “there’s no one to pick up the wounded” (69, 64). Imagining a future where she will be “kicked by horses and stung by bees and finally die of mastitis from a cow,” she envies Annabelle whom she envisions “in a lovely dry dug-out somewhere” (73, 69). Jane changes her mind about marrying Philip and lights out for the territory—to Burma, in fact, with Annabelle, to report on the war front there.
 Annabelle does indeed plan to continue her war correspondence, but she hopes to do so with Joe Rogers, who has proclaimed not only his continuing love for her but also a new attitude of respect for her work: “No other girl would have dared to fly that mission  You’re everything. You’re pretty and funny and brave. I think being so brave is one of the things I’m proudest of” (67). He promises never again to steal her stories as he did during their brief marriage. “He said he did it because he loved me so much he couldn’t bear to have me in danger,” Annabelle tells Jane, but “it turned out he married me to silence the opposition” (19). Joe now asserts, “Nothing means anything without you,” and he promises never to interfere in her work again (67). Annabelle imagines a future with this “beautiful, funny, fascinating man” in which they will cover wars together in happy comradeship (20), having learned that marriage is “too dangerous” and that “you risk ruining everything with marriage” (69). But Annabelle discovers that Joe has not {{pg|399|400}} changed when he steals her trip to Poland. The theft is bad enough, but his condescending explanation is still more infuriating: “Hawkins sent for you, but it’s too dangerous. I love you too much. It doesn’t matter for a man. P.S. Back tomorrow” (73). Annabelle’s earlier comment, “If there’s anything I really loathe, it’s a woman protector,” resonates for she senses personal motivations beneath this seemingly generous sentiment (25). Moreover, the same sentiment is expressed by Philip, as one of the male correspondents tells her: “You’ve got to be more tolerant, Annabelle. The poor guy’s been away from England for three years, fighting to protect womankind from the horrors of war. And then the womankind walks in on him. He might as well have spared himself the trouble. You can see it would upset him for a while” (25).