To say a book about Hemingway was written in “lean, muscular prose” would stretch many kilometers beyond cliché at this point. But if the shoe fits…and Clancy Sigal’s Hemingway Lives! most certainly does.

Hemingway Lives! is not so much a biography (there’s little in it we all haven’t read or heard before) as an exegesis. Sigal closely examines the work and the mind behind the work, using incidents from the life for reference and supporting documentation.

If anyone wonders how such a thoroughly “politically incorrect,” hyper-macho oaf as Hemingway could at the same time write some of the most robust yet exquisite prose of the century, changing not only the way Americans read and write but even speak the language, Sigal explains it here. He also insinuates that reports of Hemingway’s machismo, bravado and boorishness have been “greatly exaggerated.”

Sigal corrects the politicos with much insight and critical analysis, but no apologies.

Read the full article at CounterPunch.