A Farewell to Arms
- 332
- Pages
- about 6 h
- Reading time
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Our view
“A Farewell to Arms” tells a wartime love story in prose stripped almost bare, and the effect depends on the reader. Those it reaches feel dread gathering beneath the plain sentences and the small talk, all the way to the end. Others find the same spareness flat, the dialogue repetitive, and the nurse Catherine given too little life of her own. For readers who trust what is left unsaid.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
A Farewell to Arms is a novel by American writer Ernest Hemingway, set during the Italian campaign of World War I. First published in 1929, it is a first-person account of an American, Frederic Henry, serving as a lieutenant in the ambulance corps of the Italian Army. The novel describes a love affair between the American expatriate and an English nurse, Catherine Barkley.
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.5 across 664 ratings. With that many, the reader vote carries 82% of the weight and the score stays at 7.5 — the Classics average of 7.7 barely moves it.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 7.3 | 61 | 9% |
| Hardcover | 7.5 | 603 | 91% |
Frequently asked
How long is A Farewell to Arms?
It has 332 pages — longer than 70% of the ranked books in Classics.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
The same shelf — Classics — and a score of 7.5, the closest to this book.
