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Hills Like White Elephants
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Hills Like White Elephants
"Oh, cut it out!" (Hemingway 171). Could this be the true feeling of the American toward his unborn child? In the short story "Hills Like White Elephants" written by Ernest Hemingway, the two main characters find them selves in a moral dilemma in Catholic Spain. Jig, the protagonist, is pregnant by her lover the American. The American, who is not named by the author, wants Jig to have an abortion but she is not convinced. Both are seated at a train station between Barcelona and Madrid. The two rail lines divide the valley into two very different and opposite landscapes. Interestingly, the reader finds many such contrasts in the story. The dualistic nature used throughout the story by Hemingway is evident not only in the main characters' dialogue, but also in the use of setting and symbols. The train station located between two very distinct landscapes is very symbolic. One side is dry and barren while the other is green and fertile. The American and the girl are both sitting at the station on the dry barren side. It is the American who most likely chose to sit on this side. "This side, the side of the abortion, is the American side. The other side, with its imagery of life and fertility, is the girl's side"(Renner4). It is the American who initially is very persistent that the girl have the abortion. When the girl tastes the Anise del Toro, she comments that "Everything tastes like licorice. Especially all the things you waited so long for, like a...
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