The Mailer Review/Volume 4, 2010/Death, Art, and the Disturbing: Hemingway and Mailer and the Art of Writing: Difference between revisions

At their core, the art of writing both Hemingway and Mailer espouse is founded in their aspirations to, as Hemingway puts it, “tell honestly the things I have found true”(Death 1).Echoing Hemingway’s standards,Mailer believes a writer must write“to the limit of one’s honesty”(“Hazards” 399). But what exactly does this mean? Consider Hemingway’s advice to friend and contemporary writer John Dos Passos in a March  letter. Hemingway writes,“Keep them people, people, people, and don’t let them get to be symbols . . . Keep on showing it as it is. If you can show it as it really is you will do good” (). According to Hemingway’s standards, good writing is achieved by writing honestly and thus capturing life “as it really is” (). Mailer expresses a similar standard for good writing: “It proves amazing,”