Reflections on Hemingway's short story, "A Way You'll Never Be".

Mr. Patterson glowered and yet also glinted at us.

Us, the bright shiny faces of his English Lit class at Wayland Academy. It is winter, 1976 in the Kettle Moraine country of central Wisconsin. My hair is frozen, having showered late and trudged across the ice snow to a distant classroom. I anticipate drama.

"Pitter Pat" always had a flair for the dramatic, and today's lecture was no different. Our teacher knew his craft, understood how to create a stage for setting a story. His brief scholarly time could be mesmerizing or droll, depending on the student, the subject, or the quality of delivery.

Today's story, now over 40 years ago, tells of Hemingway's suicidal glide path. Patterson's performance knocked it out of the park.

He told us how Robert Frost produced a sublime poem for John F Kennedy's inauguration. Hemingway, dazzled by "The Gift Outright", put a shotgun in his mouth and pulled the trigger. Truth or inventive theatre, it framed my eagerness to read the assigned short story, "A Way You'll Never Be".

A tale of dysfunction buried inside white man's burden, this work describes an unhappy white couple on safari, complete with obligatory African guides, guns, and alcohol. (Our lead character is constantly asking his trusty black sidekick Molo to "...bring whiskey soda", to which Molo complies saying, "Yes boss!")

The husband is sick, having allowed some sort of leg wound to fester in the tropical heat. His wife tries to end the charade of the great white hunter but is denied a return to reality. Hemingway must see his character end his days on safari, not in a sterile hospital bed.

Death as a requirement of the gift of life, that is front and center. Our character comes to grip with his mortality, having left so many things undone, messy loose ends everywhere. As the story progresses, we hear of his sexual conquests (rather frightful for this 16 year old virgin, to be honest) his vacuous vice of alcohol, his self-pity. But the cackling hyenas in the bush act as bells tolling for his end, and he comes to grips with his life, its shortcomings, and his acceptance of how to seek closure on his terms.

Essentially, the white hunter finds meaning by choosing a violent, honorable death in the wilds of Africa. Like a treasonous officer caught during a battle, he pleads to be shot like a soldier instead of hung like a thief.

Hemingway obliges his character, and ultimately takes his own life as testament to his literary principles.