STORY AND PHOTO BY KAREN BOSSICK
It’s dubbed as “a deeply evocative story of ambition and betrayal.” And it has all the earmarks of a Hollywood movie.
But Paula McLain’s “The Paris Wife” is the real-life story of Paris in the 1920s and an extraordinary love affair between Ernest Hemingway and his wife Hadley.
McLain will bring this story in focus next week as the keynote lecturer at the 2017 Ernest Hemingway Seminar, which runs Thursday through Saturday, Sept. 7 through 9, at Ketchum’s Community Library.
It a story that begins in Chicago in 1920 when Hadley Richardson—a quiet 28-year-old who has all but given up on love and happiness—meets the dashing, passionate Ernest Hemingway. Setting sail for Paris, they become the golden couple in a volatile group of expatriates that includes Gertrude Stein, Ezra Pound and F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald.
And there they confront a deception that could prove the undoing of one of the great romances in literary history.
“Paula McLain is an accomplished writer and her book is a big hit and best seller,” said Scott Burton, who is organizing the conference. “She’s very knowledgeable about Paris in the ‘20s and Hemingway and Hadley. And this story has parallels to ‘The Sun Also Rises,’ which we will be discussing during the conference.”
Eighty people are primed for the seminar and the library’s program director Scott Burton expects others to join in by Wednesday.
The conference kicks off on Thursday with an opening reception from 5 to 6 p.m. It will be followed by a conversation on “The Sun Also Rises” with McLain and Arlo Haskell, director of the Key West Literary Seminar and author of the forthcoming book, “The Jaws of Key West: Smugglers, Cigar Makers and Revolutionaries.”
Friday’s agenda includes a Haskell’s presentation at 3:15 p.m. titled “Following the Sun: Hemingway in Key West.” It will be followed by a screening of the 1962 movie, “Exterminating Angel,” a satirical allegorical film on the New York Times’ Best 1,000 Films list that suggests mankind harbors savage instincts and unspeakable secrets.
Saturday’slineup includes a presentation by Community School teacher Phil Huss on “Teaching Hemingway” at 1 p.m. McLain, who recently wrote “Circling the Sun” about aviator Beryl Markham, will deliver the keynote lecture, “A Heaven Without Sentiment: Hemingway’s Pamplona 1925,”at 4 p.m.
The seminar will conclude with a dinner featuring Spanish-themed food at the Sawtooth Club at 6 p.m.
“I think the schedule speaks for itself,” said Burton. “We have a really interesting lineup. Arlo Haskell , who is visiting from Key West, is a very interesting speaker who will bring a Key West element into thinking about Hemingway.
“And the film, ‘Exterminating Angel, is an interesting surrealist film by a Spanish filmmaker. It does not necessary tie in directly with ‘The Sun Also Rises,’ but it it’s a very symbolic film with parallels to that book. It’s a story of well-to-do dinner guests at a mansion in a Mexico City who, after having dinner, are unable to leave. “
None other than film critic Roger Ebert said the dinner guests represent the ruling class in Franco’s Spain.
This year’s book discussion will focus on “The Sun Also Rises,” Hemingway’s 1926 novel about expatriates who travel from Paris to watch the running of the bulls and the bullfights.
“The book discussions are always popular and I think this one should be very popular since ‘The Sun Also Rises’ is the favorite Hemingway novel of a lot of people,” said Burton. “Really diving into it could be exciting for a lot of Hemingway fans.
“Often, people have a lot of thoughts about what they read. And they enjoy hearing other people’s perspectives—it makes them think about what they’ve read in a different way. Discussing the book allows people to tap into abstract part of their brain in the way that they look at and analyze literature in a way they perhaps don’t get to very often.
Cost of the seminar is $60. To learn more and register for the seminar, go to www.comlib.org or call Burton at 208-806-2621.