Essay Database

Pain and disillusionment, familiar attributes to many people during World War I, are the highlighted human characteristics in the vignette "Nick Sat Against the Wall..." Author Ernest Hemingway utilizes both irony and symbols to communicate to this thought. The vignette opens with a nasty image. Victim to either machine gun fire or shrapnel, Nick is dragged away from immediate danger by comrades. He was propped up against "the wall of the church." This description is …

…Sat Against the Wall..." is clearly a morbid and sad commentary. Though it underlines the lowlights or terror, the war also serves as a positive platform for Nick's growth and ever continuing education. His scornful tone is a reflection of his maturity. By attaining their "separate peace," the narrator claims that the two fallen comrades are also "not patriots;" ironically, through death came their "peace" and through losing their homeland they were no longer "patriots."