A Farewell to Arms

In Hemingway’s novel A farewell to Arms he uses point of view and symbolism to show the brutality of war and the passion of love. He uses polar opposites in his work to make a balance between the dark and the light sides of life.
Frederic is the main character of A Farewell to Arms and the book is told in first person through his perspective for the most part. This telling of the story helps give peace of mind because you know if he is telling the story through flashbacks then you know that he will make it to the end. So now you can focus on the main point of the story which is to show you the difference between love and hate. Frederic has a love interest in the book and since the story is told through him you can see both sides almost first hand. Frederic mainly only talks about his experiences and the mistakes that he wished he had learned from.
The main symbol and most important one in this book is rain. Rain naturally sets a dark and gloomy mood and so it conveys a strong message throughout the book. It rains when Amyo is shot, Catherine says she is afraid of the rain, and it rains when Frederic must go back to the front. These examples show that rain in this book means dark times and can foreshadow what is to come. It is raining when Catherine tells Frederic that she is pregnant and this is proven at the end when she dies from giving birth to a stillborn boy. The light and dark contrast is shown here again because giving birth is life and is a very happy moment. Then the rain comes and hints of something bad, death follows soon after. Hemingway’s balance strikes again after a peaceful moment he turns it into sorrow. The balance that Hemingway creates in this book is disturbing but very true to life. The cycle that he shows is perfectly followed in this book because it is a war story but filled with love. It is a story of life but filled with death. It is a story of pain but filled with pleasure. The message is not exactly clear but it seems to say that