Hemingway Exhibit at the JFK Library in Boston

 In a post in November, 2015, I noted that the Hemingway exhibit was on display at the Morgan Library in New York City.  It has moved to Boston’s Kennedy Museum, where it will be until December 31^st. 

As those of you who read this blog know, the largest exhibit on Hemingway’s writings, notes, memorabilia and displays is at the JFK Museum in Boston.  After Hemingway’s death, his widow, Mary, was permitted to return to their home in Cuba to gather up belongings and Hemingway possessions.  Fortunately, she took drafts of manuscripts, letters, notes and all that she could.  John Kennedy had been a fan of Hemingway and, after Hemingway’s death and then President Kennedy’s death, Mary and Jackie Kennedy met and agreed that the planned JFK Library would be the repository of the largest collection of Hemingway writings and memorabilia. 

I was able to get to the Morgan Exhibit but only briefly while I was in NY at a writer’s conference. I’ll be heading to Boston this summer to view the exhibit in a more leisurely fashion.  

I’m particularly interested in the drafts of various endings to A Farewell to Arms.  Hemingway apparently penned forty-seven possible endings.  Eight of those are on display at the new exhibit.  I must admit to wishing that Catherine had survived along with the baby, but that’s not the ending Hemingway chose to go with. 

Patrick Hemingway, the only surviving child of Hemingway, was on hand on the opening day of the exhibit in Boston.  He presently makes his home in Bozeman, Montana.  

Interesting trivia:  John Kennedy wrote to Hemingway asking permission to use the phrase “Grace under pressure” in the opening of his own profiles in courage.  Hemingway agreed.  Hemingway was, however, too ill to accept President Kennedy’s invitation in January of 1961 to attend the inauguration.  During that year, he killed himself.