True At First Light

Ernest Hemingway’s True at First Light, published posthumously, tells the story of a safari he went on in East Africa with his fourth wife, Mary, between 1953 and 1954. The book's genre is debated by critics – Hemingway's son, Patrick, who edited and published the book in 1999, many years after his father's death, believed that it was more than a journal, and should be considered a work of fiction. Many critics counter his argument, claiming the book is part-travel journal, part-fictionalized memoir, with a hint of a novel at the end. The book lives somewhere between the realms of fiction and non-fiction; the storyline is interrupted periodically with Hemingway's thoughts on the nature of writing. Hemingway explores many elements of conflict in the book – between two partners in a marriage, between Europeans and native Africans, and between a man and his own creative work.

The book does not follow a chronological plot, because Hemingway filled his notebooks with digressions and anecdotes on topics that are only loosely related to the subjects at hand. The main storyline, however, takes place in the Kenya Colony in the 1950s. Patrick Hemingway notes in his introduction to the book that the story is set during the Mau-Mau rebellion, in which many Kenyan tribes rebelled against their English colonizers. Hemingway and Mary were staying with the Kamba tribe; Patrick Hemingway writes that if the Kamba had joined the revolution during this period, his father and Mary would have been at risk of being attacked because of their status as wealthy white Americans.

The events of the storyline take place primarily in December of the rebellion. The book begins when Philip Percival, a white hunter, leaves the camp, putting Ernest in charge of day-to-day operations. Ernest is concerned because the camp has food, alcohol, and weapons; he worries that will put him and the others at risk of being attacked by rebels. He is deputized as an assistant to the game warden and spends his days wandering around the reserve, communicating with local tribes and keeping an eye on the property. His companions are two African scouts, Chungo and Arap Meina, and, briefly, the game warden for the district, who goes by GC, which stands for “Gin-Crazed.”



Meanwhile, Mary has been tracking a black-maned lion and is hoping to complete her kill before Christmas. Ernest spends many chapters concerned about Mary's ability to kill the animal, because of her small stature, poor aim, and his fear that she will be too kind-hearted to kill him. He also writes about his romantic feelings toward a local woman named Debba, whom the scouts jokingly refer to as his second wife. Debba and the other villagers teach Ernest tribal customs and traditions.

Halfway through the book, Mary's lion is killed, and the villagers have a dance to celebrate the kill. During this time, Mary has to leave the camp to travel to Nairobi because she has dysentery and needs medical treatment. After she leaves, Ernest kills a leopard, and there is another dance. After Mary returns, the pair sets off on a plane tour of the Congo basin.

Throughout the book, Hemingway digresses into more philosophical segments on his relationships with other writers, most notably D. H. Lawrence and George Orwell. He writes about cafes in Paris, the woods of Michigan, and his close relationships with local men. Written in a stream of consciousness fashion, these are distinct from the storyline. This is likely because Hemingway only completed the first draft of these journals, later deciding they were not suitable for publication. Because they were published after his death, they were not edited in the manner of his previous novels and short stories.



True at First Light was poorly reviewed by critics, who thought it was slow, and that the suspense in the setting and conflicts of the novel did not carry readers through the book at a satisfying pace. The book is not one of Hemingway's more famous – he is known best for The Old Man and the Sea, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and A Farewell to Arms, but the book does carry over some themes that run through his more famous books, including ideas about masculinity, colonialism, hunting, and conflict between man and nature and man and himself. Hemingway spent many years working on True at First Light before giving up and placing it in a safety deposit box in Havana, Cuba. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, he worried that the book was lost, which may also explain why he did not complete it.