"[FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS] HAS GONE FINE LATELY…" EXCEPTIONAL HEMINGWAY LETTER TO HIS MOTHER-IN-LAW
HEMINGWAY, Ernest. Typed letter signed to Edna Gellhorn. [Finca Vigia, Cuba, circa 1940]. One leaf, measuring 8-1/2 by 11 inches, typing on recto, signed in ink. Matted and framed with a portrait, entire piece measures 16-1/2 by 22-1/2 inches. $9500.
A wonderful lengthy Hemingway typed letter signed (partly in autograph) to his mother-in-law, Edna Gellhorn (the mother of Martha Gellhorn, his third wife), in which the author asks her to come down to Cuba for a visit, tells her that Martha has learned to hunt, and discusses the progress of his new book, For Whom the Bell Tolls. Beautifully framed.
The letter reads: "Dear Mother — Please come in March and then in May too. You see it was very unfair to you andto Martha both that you saw each other only for a minute in New York and we can't wait until May to see you. But are not going to put up with only a week either [autograph in pencil] So come both times. [Typing] You see beside loveing you I like you better than anybody I know and we all have a grand time together. Also you bring me luck because you came into Mr. Josie's [Sloppy Joe's in Key West] that time and when you were last I worked awfully well. Then, too, we will have a fine time here and the weather has turned lovely again. We haven't enough of our lives left to all be apart so much so please come and we will make a big celebration. There are lots of good new books and it is ideal here now and you should get away from the damned cold too. Marty is fine. It has taken her a little while to start to really relax from going at such a speed but she is doing it now and everything is all straight and clear and she has no worries. She is much healthier than she ever was and strong as airplane fabric. I think that Idaho was sort of a turning point in her health. Also, and you will laugh and think it's not true, she has learned to shoot and loves it and hunts all over the country by herself while I am writing and brings back game that we can eat. That's a phenomenon if I ever saw one. But you know wing shooting is truly fun or else guys like FitzPatrick and me have been crazy for forty-five years. And Marty has found out about it being fun. And then the quail and doves and guinea (wild) that are here are so wonderful to eat that the eater that Marty has become guides the gun with want-to-eat-them precision. Then you may have noticed that this daughter of yours can do anything and this is just another thing she has learned to do. But it certainly is fun for me to have a hunting partner and a wife both. Book [For Whom the Bell Tolls] has gone fine lately. Averaged 700 words a day week before last and last week wrote 4700 words. Am trying to keep it good and sound and not let anything worry. You come down and it will be wonderful and I will write good to show off. [autograph in ink] Much love Ernest." Hemingway and Martha Gellhorn met in Key West in December 1939—in Sloppy Joe's, mentioned in this letter—and married on November 21, 1940. Although they divorced on December 21, 1945, Hemingway maintained a close friendship with his former mother-in-law, Edna Gellhorn. Edna, an accomplished and formidable woman like her daughter, had been a devoted suffragette who later became one of the founders of the National League of Women Voters in 1920 after the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment.
Expected fold lines, paper evenly toned. Beautifully framed.