Talk:Ernest Hemingway

Birth_name "duplicate"?

What's the reasoning behind this revert beyond "dup[licate]"? Shouldn't birth_name be a standard for most biographical articles? Arbor to SJ (talk) 02:59, 14 March 2026 (UTC)

Only when the person's name later changed; here it did not. Nikkimaria (talk) 03:03, 14 March 2026 (UTC)

I thought birth_name always reflected the full name different from the article title. Arbor to SJ (talk) 12:49, 14 March 2026 (UTC)

@Arbor to SJ: I agree with you. I raised this issue here: Template talk:Infobox person/Archive 40#Birth name. Khiikiat (talk) 08:28, 24 August 2026 (UTC)

Scar

Section needs to be changed. Found a copy of the citation here and it doesn't mention his accidentally pulling the cord, it only mentions that it happened in the bathroom. this source mentions he was trying to fix the cord of the skylight when it fell, not that it was pulled accidentally. ~2026-12663-47 (talk) 08:15, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

Yeah it does. I just went through the history and it's been in the article for more than 15 years and somehow slipped past two or three rewrites. That info will be in the biographies, will take a look and rework the section. Thanks for catching it and posting here. Victoria (tk) 18:42, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

So Farah, Andrew, the most recent biographer and author of Hemingway's Brain (Farah is a doctor and focuses on the many head injuries), writes on page 30:

After dinner and drinks with Ada and Archie MacLeish, they returned at about 11, and by 2 a.m. Ernest entered the bathroom. The skylight had already been cracked when Hemingway confused its cord with the toilet chain and mistakenly pulled it. As Hemingway fumbled with the cords, the entire skylight fell onto his head, gashing him two inches above the left eye. Pauline summoned MacLeish, who managed to get his dazed friend into a cab, which reached the American Hospital at Neuilly, a suburb of Paris, just before 3 a.m.

Will rewrite accordingly and swap the citation. Victoria (tk) 18:50, 3 May 2026 (UTC)

Add more context surrounding Hemingway's investigation by the FBI

The article is unduly short regarding this fact(and it is also a recurring point of focus throughout the article). It's never really explained why the FBI was investigating Hemingway, the article abruptly mentions that fact right after establishing his participation in the Coastal Picket Force as if they were investigating him on a whim.

It's actually very clear and well-known historically that

"The FBI monitored Ernest Hemingway primarily due to Director J. Edgar Hoover's suspicions regarding his anti-fascist political leanings, his sympathetic ties to the Spanish Republic, his associations with left-wing figures, and his later controversial alignment with Fidel Castro's regime in Cuba" -paraphrashing the Guardian (https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/jul/03/fbi-and-ernest-hemingway)

This should be added into the article. Since it's semi=protected and I can't insert this addition, let this also serve as an edit request. ~2026-30499-63 (talk) 14:56, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

Well it's complicated and thus not spun out in this article that's a summary and at about 9000 words is at its max size for a Wikipedia:Featured article on Wikipedia. There's a big long convoluted story in Jeffrey Meyer's Hemingway: A Biography beginning on page 367 about how he got caught up in the FBI (an agent in Cuba named Leddy wrote to J. Edgar Hoover (page 378), who else was involved (lots of names & affiliations) - it was Cuba in wartime - the lack of substance in the 124 page report , how the FBI ultimately decided not to pursue the matter (beginning of 381) for various reasons. For this article we need to stick to high-quality reliable sources, which Meyer's is. Stating that the FBI started watching him then and continued to do so throughout the rest of his life is about the right amount for this article. I'll an additional sentence, either to the text or the note, but it will be cited to Meyers' biography rather than the Guardian. Victoria (tk) 21:42, 23 May 2026 (UTC)

Then make space. This is necessary to make the article better, might I cite WP:IAR. You've also stated how relevant/important it is in Hemingway's own biography. At the very least, we need to provide context on why they started following him, for it to make at least a bit of sense for the reader. ~2026-30499-63 (talk) 07:09, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

I went through your edit, but it still lacks in context. It seems very barebones, and abrupt. There is important context to be established first. In the perspective of a reader, "Why did they think he was a communist?" would be the foremost question in my mind ~2026-30499-63 (talk) 08:27, 24 May 2026 (UTC)

Infobox

@Nikkimaria: Are you implacably opposed to the inclusion of the following in the infobox?

1. |caption=Hemingway, c. 1939
2. |birth_name=Ernest Miller Hemingway
3. Marriage dates using {{marriage}}

Arbor to SJ and SpiritEdit have attempted to add Ernest Miller Hemingway: , .

OfficerDiaz, Goszei, CybJubal, Purrmissgurrr2, Hogfather&Son, Yedaman54, Windywendi, and IvanScrooge98 have attempted to add the marriage dates: , , , , , , , .

All attempts have been reverted by you. Khiikiat (talk) 08:30, 26 August 2026 (UTC)

Yep - unnecessary content should be excluded. Nikkimaria (talk) 00:00, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

@Nikkimaria, Arbor to SJ, SpiritEdit, OfficerDiaz, Goszei, CybJubal, Purrmissgurrr2, Hogfather&Son, Yedaman54, Windywendi, and IvanScrooge98: I have started an RfC below. Khiikiat (talk) 08:14, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

RfC: Infobox

Ernest Hemingway
Hemingway in 1939
Born	Ernest Miller Hemingway (1899-07-21)July 21, 1899 Oak Park, Illinois, U.S.
Died	July 2, 1961(1961-07-02) (aged 61) Ketchum, Idaho, U.S.
Spouses	Hadley Richardson ​ ​ (m. 1921; div. 1927)​ Pauline Pfeiffer ​ ​ (m. 1927; div. 1940)​ Martha Gellhorn ​ ​ (m. 1940; div. 1945)​ Mary Welsh ​ (m. 1946)​
Children	Jack Patrick Gloria
Mother	Grace Hall Hemingway
Writing career
Works	Full list
Notable awards	Pulitzer Prize for Fiction (1953) Nobel Prize in Literature (1954)
Signature

Should the following be included in the infobox?

1. |caption=Hemingway in 1939
2. |birth_name=Ernest Miller Hemingway
3. Marriage dates using {{marriage}}

Khiikiat (talk) 08:13, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

Survey

• Include all three. 1 lets the reader know when the photograph was taken. Captions like this are routinely included in biographical infoboxes. 2 & 3 constitute basic biographical information. Such information is routinely included in biographical infoboxes. The inclusion of all three is supported by the documentation for {{Infobox person}} and {{Infobox writer}}. Khiikiat (talk) 08:13, 27 August 2026 (UTC)
• Include all three per above. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 12:42, 27 August 2026 (UTC)
• Include all three. It is occasionally justified to exclude standard infobox info for redundancy or other reasons, but this is not one of those cases. — Goszei (talk) 15:13, 27 August 2026 (UTC)
• Include all three this is standard biographical info. Yedaman54 (talk) 16:31, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

  That is why of course we have written text and not just junk boxes. Ceoil (talk) 15:51, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

  Then remove the whole infobox if it’s just junk to you, duh. Trying to be civil in a conversation might help defend your case. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 15:52, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

  I agree with Ivan that the infobox should be removed. It has been six months since it was decided to add it, and that seems enough time to reconsider. Ceoil (talk) 16:08, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

• Comment: the caption has included a date for the 15+ years I've been watching/working on this page, so it's not an issue. As for the others, 5 lines are added to the infobox: one for the name, and four for the wives marriage dates. This is an issue because it causes text squash in the "Early life" section, and fighting to keep in images without squash is an ongoing battle. The wives marriage dates don't seem all that important in my view; that he had four wives is interesting, but when and for how long? Meh. To save from adding another line, the name, in my view, is redundant, since it's the first 3 words of the article. It's best not to bloat boxes and it's best to get consensus (which is what this RfC will do) but I'd leave those fields blank. Because they exist doesn't mean they have to be filled. Victoria (tk) 21:10, 27 August 2026 (UTC)

  Adding to my comment above: a couple years ago after the page had been tidied and prepared for a main page run it looked like this. It's degraded since and needs another overhaul. I'm not sure why we have his mother in the infobox, except that someone has written an article about her. There's a cottage industry of Hemingway-related stuff (just take a look at the nav box on the bottom of the page). The picture of the house keeps coming back for the same reason and needs space. I'm not opposed to the images and would actually like to re-add the one of him as a child with long hair which was explained in the text (I've removed that para for now) because it's eventually related to themes in his writing. The images don't look squashed my less-than-two-week old laptop with a nice screen but in my older laptop with a 13 inch screen they were squashed. On the phone it's not squashed, which is good (though today the box is shorter than it was).

  Re this RfC: first, there's never been a question re the date in the image caption, so that shouldn't be part of the RfC. Second, having the editor who has spent a lot of time working this page post a comment is not stonewalling - saying so raises the temperature unnecessarily (I'm looking at you, Nemov. Consider striking that comment, maybe?); third, personally I don't really care, but the edit warring is tiring. If the marriage dates go in, be aware that it affects the next section. Same with the birthname. And finally, I'm removing Grace Hemingway's name. If anyone wants to complain, I suppose this is the place to do so. Victoria (tk) 17:33, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

• Exclude. Per Victoria, and per MOS:IBP. The OP's rationale directly contradicts the relevant guideline: "Just because an infobox has a particular field, it does not mean that the field should or must be populated", and which parameters to include is determined on a per-article basis rather than what other pages do or don't do. Nikkimaria (talk) 23:26, 27 August 2026 (UTC)
• Include all three per Khiikiat. The case isn't quite as strong for the marriages since they take up a lot of space relative to the amount of value provided, but I would still lean toward keeping them. –CWenger (^ • @) 01:31, 28 August 2026 (UTC)
• Include all three So much needless stonewalling on infobox questions. Nemov (talk) 13:29, 28 August 2026 (UTC)

  So much preconceptions. Stonelling, what? Ceoil (talk) 15:49, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

• Include all three - (Brought here from RFC/A) I would say that including the wives and the marriage duration dates doesnt feel too scrunched, doesn't bother me. Also I think marriage dates on notable BLP's is usually helpful in the long run. MaximusEditor (talk) 14:38, 28 August 2026 (UTC)
• Exclude Per Victoria and Nikkimaria; especially the marriages and their date spans - bloat leading to an overlong infobox that adds no new info not in the lead paragraphs and pushes the box down into the first header of the main article. I don't think the number of marriages and how long they lasted is the most immediate thing readers too busy to read the lead are looking for; in fact, it seems gossipy and middle-brow. Ceoil (talk) 22:14, 28 August 2026 (UTC)
• Remove Infobox per IvanScrooge98 (talk) Ceoil (talk) 16:13, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

  That’s not what I proposed. I was obviously being sarcastic and the above user is instrumentally misrepresenting my words. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 16:37, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

  "instrumentally misrepresenting my words" is that also sarcastic? Ceoil (talk) 17:47, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

  Have you always interacted with other users like this in the long time you’ve spent on this project? Because I’ve faced blocks for much less. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 18:28, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

  You wont be blocked for removing the infobox. Reverted maybe. Ceoil (talk) 20:48, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

  Alright WP:DFTT I guess. Bye. ~ IvanScrooge98 (talk) 20:51, 29 August 2026 (UTC)

• Remove the signature from the infobox. I've always found these ornamental and not about "info". Suggest it's removed. Ceoil (talk) 17:52, 29 August 2026 (UTC)
• Include marriages and photo year at least. Marriages are a fundamental element of a person's life, and knowing when a photograph was taken is also basic and helpful context. Repeating his name as his birth name explicitly may be unnecessary, since "Hemingway" will already be in the infobox at least 3 times and Ernest at least twice, and his middle name is already in the opening sentence too. His birth name is not significantly different from his common name, so including it doesn't add much. —⁠ ⁠BarrelProof (talk) 23:49, 29 August 2026 (UTC)
• I'd say:

1. Yes, the caption - to me - seems like it ought to be there.
2. Yes, as some people may not know that 'Miller' is Hemingway's middle name.
3. Yes, I think knowing when it ended in the formatting is perfect.

AyrshireEileen (talk) 17:44, 31 August 2026 (UTC)

• Include all three that's pretty standard infobox stuff. Marriages does take up a bit of space, but I think they're so important to a person's life that it's worth it. The caption and full name should definitely be included. Raddy•_•r••o•_•r••o•_• 17:55, 1 September 2026 (UTC)
• Include at least the marriages and caption – Neutral about the name, but I disagree with the "Early Life" section getting squashed being an issue. If anything, it's an issue right now because there's a few lines that are not squashed, leading to a very awkward look. Increasing the length of the infobox is going to work out nicely leave no awkward space where a few words can extend into between the infobox and the it the image of Hemingway as a baby. Considering that and that marriages are classic infobox materials, I think the upsides outweigh the downsides here. –Maltazarian ^{ᚾparley$\lor$investigateᛅ} 16:55, 4 September 2026 (UTC)
• @Khiikiat Please put back the marriage names and dates in the info box. Because some of Hemingway's work is semi-autobiographical, it's helpful to have his marriage info easy to find. I've personally checked the page multiple times when reading his work to see which wife he was married to when he wrote a particular story, and I just came to the page to check that again (in this case, "Get a Seeing-Eye Dog," about a married man having memory troubles in the 1950s), and found Hemingway's marriages were missing from the info box. It's pertinent info - please restore it. Michaelavolio (talk) 18:01, 9 September 2026 (UTC)
• Include all three as this is standard info. Szxq (talk) 17:56, 11 September 2026 (UTC)
• Include 2": Include caption and marriage, but omit the birth name. Birth name adds very little useful information, plus it is already included in the lead. No need to populate a field just because it is available! NicoR8 (talk) 11:05, 15 September 2026 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 September 2026

Small capitalization missing in the beginning of the following paragraph (Cuba section, third paragraph):

he began work on The Garden of Eden in January 1946, and had finished 800 pages by June.[note 6][137] During the post-war years, he also began work on a trilogy tentatively titled "The Land", "The Sea" and "The Air", which he wanted to combine in one novel titled The Sea Book. Both projects stalled. Mellow writes that Hemingway's inability to write was "a symptom of his troubles" during these years.

As you can see, explicitly, the first 'he' in the paragrah should be changed to 'He' WinstonSamsa (talk) 17:25, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

 Done, thanks. DrOrinScrivello (talk) 17:42, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 5 September 2026

In the second paragraph of the Key West section of the Ernest Hemingway Wiki-page. The paragraph states "In April, he was still working on the ending, which he may have rewritten as many as seventeen times".

I've looked the number up and many sources (linked below) put the number at 47:

BBC report: https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-18769231

BBC academic interview: https://www.bbc.com/news/av/entertainment-arts-18814364

the guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2012/jul/06/a-farewell-to-alternative-endings

The proposed change would be to replace 'seventeen times' with 'forty seven' times. WinstonSamsa (talk) 16:16, 5 September 2026 (UTC)

 Done Day Creature (talk) 20:08, 6 September 2026 (UTC)

Just to note that I may be changing this. The article relies primarily on scholarly sources; a quick check in one of the biographies says 32 endings. We can't really know for sure because Hemingway tended to exaggerate; and I'm not finding this info in the FAC version so it got added later and misattributed. In other words, it needs more research. Victoria (tk) 20:25, 6 September 2026 (UTC)

@Victoriaearle The Hemingway Library edition of A Farewell to Arms includes in the back a bunch of drafts of the ending (plus other edited bits from elsewhere in the novel) from the Hemingway archives at the JFK Library, and it's difficult to say which of them should count as separate endings. Plotwise, there are really only a few different endings, as I recall, but there are a lot of edited versions of the ending, so I wouldn't know how to count each draft. I would personally err more on the side of fewer, but there are a lot of attempts at the ending.

On another topic: It looks like you removed the list of Hemingway's marriages in the info box. Would you put those back? Michaelavolio (talk) 17:51, 9 September 2026 (UTC)

I need a scholarly secondary source for it instead of the primary source. Jeffrey Meyers says 32, which I'm inclined to go with on that article page when I get to it. I didn't take out the wives but they are there again. There's an request for comment above to achieve consensus for adding the dates to each wife. Victoria (tk) 21:37, 9 September 2026 (UTC)

Adding: the article A Farewell to Arms gives different numbers. The info shouldn't be in this biography, so I'm removing it from here and it can be worked out properly in the article about the novel. Victoria (tk) 20:35, 6 September 2026 (UTC)