2003/09/01 by Matthew Stewart · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · Psychology · #American and British Literature Analysis #American Literature and Culture #Literature, Film, and Journalism Analysis #Witness #Irony #Narrative #Context (archaeology) #Face (sociological concept) #Disgust #Literature #Tone (literature) #Politics #Aesthetics #History #Art #Law #Psychology #Philosophy #Linguistics #Social psychology #Political science #Anger
paper · doi:10.1353/hem.2004.0014
openalex publication_date 2003/09/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
"On the Quai at Smyrna" exemplifies Hemingway's skill in fictionalizing events he did not witness. The magnitude and particularities of the Smyrna catastrophe are now largely forgotten. Using his iceberg principle, Hemingway creates a remarkable but ultimately puzzling narrative voice. Laying open the story's diplomatic and military context and revealing the horrific events that the speaker witnessed helps to elucidate the speaker's frame of mind, his manner of speaking and the story's tone. The speaker's self-protective irony is generated by self-disgust resulting from an enforced and prolonged powerlessness in the face of inhumane behavior, itself the byproduct of duplicitous politics.