Critical Thinking Blog #6

Throughout The Snows of Kilimanjaro, Hemingway portrays Helen as emasculating Harry because of her independence and strength. Since he has to depend on her financially in outright neglect of societal norm, he is not the provider and therefore loses his sense of masculinity in the relationship. As a result, their relationship crumbles despite her fervent love for him. When Helen asks them what they have done in their lives to deserve their fate he responds,

I suppose what I did was forget to put iodine on it when I first scratched it. Then
I didn’t pay any attention to it because I never infect. Then, later, when it got bad, it was probably using that weak carbolic solution when the other antiseptics ran out
that paralyzed the minute blood vessels and started the gangrene (Hemingway 1985).

Even though he thinks he is not answering her question, Harry describes metaphorically the corruption of their relationship due to his inability to accept her as the supporter of their family financially. Overtime, the emasculating nature of their relationship cripples Harry leaving him devoid of any love toward her. Since his career as a writer has ultimately not been as successful as he had hoped, he not only feels like a failure, but also has to rely on his wife to remain afloat. Also, Helen is able to sustain an intelligent repartee with Harry and does “masculine” actives better than he does and therefore unintentionally reduces his masculinity even more so. She is able to quickly become adept at hunting, an action overly deemed manly by society, which makes him feel inferior.