Farewell To Arms

First of all, A Farewell to Arms was horribly depressing. The entire time the two main characters, Henry and Catherine are on this quest to have this beautiful life together, but the obstacles in their life deter them from ever finding this “happy” place in their lives where they can just relax and enjoy each other. Henry, the protagonist of the novel, has no passion in his life until he meets Catherine. Although she at first is just playing this flirty game with Henry, and is just trying to seduce him because of her grief for her dead fiancé, I don’t think she intended to fall in love with him. By the end of the novel, she was pregnant, and I truly think that even though she didn’t mean to truly have feelings for Henry, I do believe by the end of the novel she was completely in love with him. By the end of the novel, it seemed almost too good to be true for the two to finally just have each other. I kind of expected her death and problematic pregnancy to be her demise. I think the plot, and the overall “romantic tragedy” is very stereotypical to the time period. I think people very typically associate these exaggerated romances with war, especially during World War I and this novel fit perfectly into this category.