"David had planned to send the two girls to swim and...to take the old Isotta...to have the brakes fixed...But Catherine had asked him to please swim with them and to do the car the next day..." (135)
Brakes->slow down. Got it got it got it.
So he puts off fixing the brakes and goes with them.
"...he had driven them to the turnout for the cove and shown them both on the way how dangerously the brakes were working."
"You'd kill yourself with this car," he told Marita. "It's a crime to drive it the way it is." (136)
I underlined it so it seemed to me like it could be significant (suicide?) but brakes are dangerous, if you can't slow down, you will kill yourself... "It's a crime"... Okay fine, it's a crime, whatever.
After he finds out Catherine has burned all of his stories and they each threaten to kill the other (223) Catherine announces that she is going away, to Paris, because "We've wasted time as it is..." (225)
"How are you going?"
"With the Bug."
"You shouldn't drive alone...You shouldn't, Devil. Really. I couldn't let you."
...
"If you wait we'll go together."
"I don't want to go together. I want to go tomorrow and in the Bug."
Pause: No, no pause, I don't want to get off message. Well, Pause, briefly: Is the Bug automobile a Volkswagen? It is not the same as the Isotta, right? Doesn't have brake problems? Unpause. I have to pause again, ever so briefly. "With the Bug" is an unusual way of referring to the car you are driving, no? "In the Bug," as she immediately says, is the usual way. That is intentional on Hemingway's part. I don't know why he does that.
He doesn't say "You shouldn't drive" because of the brakes, there is nothing wrong with the "Bug's" brakes presumably, what he says is "You shouldn't drive alone." That also is intentional. You have to pay attention to every single word. Hemingway does stuff like this to slow the reader down.
Two pages after they pledge to murder each other he is concerned about her safety driving alone oh yeah that makes sense
She took the train.
"(Catherine) took the train for Biarritz," (Madame Aurol) said. "She left this letter for Monsieur."(233)
...
"Where did she leave the car? he asked.
"At the station," Madame said. "The boy rode down with her. He brought back the key..."
..."He put her aboard. There were very few passengers."
Just to make sure I have this right:
"It's not a bad train," David said. (234)
Catherine's letter:
David, I knew very suddenly you must know how terrible it was. Worse than hitting someone, a child is the worst I guess--with a car. The thump on the fender or maybe just a small bump and then all the rest of it happening and the crowd gathering to scream. The Frenchwoman screaming ecrasseuse even if it was the child's fault. I did it and I knew I did it and I can't undo it. It's too awful to understand. But it happened...(237)
She is referring to burning the stories.
Man. What the fuck, man? "David, I knew very suddenly you must know how terrible it was." What is she talking about? They were David's stories! Which she burned, his "child" which she destroyed! What does she mean to presume to tell David "how terrible it was"?
She does not say she did hit a child with a car, she writes that "it" was worse than hitting someone, even a child, with a car. That is a strange analogy to make. After all the preceding pages about cars and car brakes and danger and killing each other and killing yourself driving, that's the analogy? And she proceeds to go into some detail about this analogous situation: "thump," "bump," "crowd gathering," "screaming," "even if it was the child's fault." "Even if it was the child's fault." "But it happened," "I did it." And try looking up the meaning of "ecrasseuse," I did. There is no ecrasseuse." There is "crasseuse" and you know what "crasseuse" means? Filthy. Filthy? Filthy. That's what the Frenchwoman would scream at Catherine for hitting a child with a car? Now, when I googled ecrasseuse I got an entry "FABLE IL ÉTAIT une fois une grosse dame L'Ecrasseuse...", a story (state?) about a gross woman L'Ecrasseuse, so I googled "l'ecrasseuse." "The grinder," it means.I swear somewhere in Garden there was mention of a grinder.* Whatever, I'm too tired now to follow any further. For all of the above, and in all of this book, I must remember to substitute in my mind Hemingway for anything Catherine or David says or does.
*No, I was wrong. No grinder in Garden. And in looking up more definitions of crasseuse, ecrasseuse, l'ecrasseuse, it seems to be a general insult for a woman, "slimy" was one other definition I found and the "Fable" I ran across above is google translated as "a fat lady The Wretcher."
Brakes->slow down. Got it got it got it.
So he puts off fixing the brakes and goes with them.
"...he had driven them to the turnout for the cove and shown them both on the way how dangerously the brakes were working."
"You'd kill yourself with this car," he told Marita. "It's a crime to drive it the way it is." (136)
I underlined it so it seemed to me like it could be significant (suicide?) but brakes are dangerous, if you can't slow down, you will kill yourself... "It's a crime"... Okay fine, it's a crime, whatever.
After he finds out Catherine has burned all of his stories and they each threaten to kill the other (223) Catherine announces that she is going away, to Paris, because "We've wasted time as it is..." (225)
"How are you going?"
"With the Bug."
"You shouldn't drive alone...You shouldn't, Devil. Really. I couldn't let you."
...
"If you wait we'll go together."
"I don't want to go together. I want to go tomorrow and in the Bug."
Pause: No, no pause, I don't want to get off message. Well, Pause, briefly: Is the Bug automobile a Volkswagen? It is not the same as the Isotta, right? Doesn't have brake problems? Unpause. I have to pause again, ever so briefly. "With the Bug" is an unusual way of referring to the car you are driving, no? "In the Bug," as she immediately says, is the usual way. That is intentional on Hemingway's part. I don't know why he does that.
He doesn't say "You shouldn't drive" because of the brakes, there is nothing wrong with the "Bug's" brakes presumably, what he says is "You shouldn't drive alone." That also is intentional. You have to pay attention to every single word. Hemingway does stuff like this to slow the reader down.
Two pages after they pledge to murder each other he is concerned about her safety driving alone oh yeah that makes sense
She took the train.
"(Catherine) took the train for Biarritz," (Madame Aurol) said. "She left this letter for Monsieur."(233)
...
"Where did she leave the car? he asked.
"At the station," Madame said. "The boy rode down with her. He brought back the key..."
..."He put her aboard. There were very few passengers."
Just to make sure I have this right:
"It's not a bad train," David said. (234)
Catherine's letter:
David, I knew very suddenly you must know how terrible it was. Worse than hitting someone, a child is the worst I guess--with a car. The thump on the fender or maybe just a small bump and then all the rest of it happening and the crowd gathering to scream. The Frenchwoman screaming ecrasseuse even if it was the child's fault. I did it and I knew I did it and I can't undo it. It's too awful to understand. But it happened...(237)
She is referring to burning the stories.
Man. What the fuck, man? "David, I knew very suddenly you must know how terrible it was." What is she talking about? They were David's stories! Which she burned, his "child" which she destroyed! What does she mean to presume to tell David "how terrible it was"?
She does not say she did hit a child with a car, she writes that "it" was worse than hitting someone, even a child, with a car. That is a strange analogy to make. After all the preceding pages about cars and car brakes and danger and killing each other and killing yourself driving, that's the analogy? And she proceeds to go into some detail about this analogous situation: "thump," "bump," "crowd gathering," "screaming," "even if it was the child's fault." "Even if it was the child's fault." "But it happened," "I did it." And try looking up the meaning of "ecrasseuse," I did. There is no ecrasseuse." There is "crasseuse" and you know what "crasseuse" means? Filthy. Filthy? Filthy. That's what the Frenchwoman would scream at Catherine for hitting a child with a car? Now, when I googled ecrasseuse I got an entry "FABLE IL ÉTAIT une fois une grosse dame L'Ecrasseuse...", a story (state?) about a gross woman L'Ecrasseuse, so I googled "l'ecrasseuse." "The grinder," it means.
*No, I was wrong. No grinder in Garden. And in looking up more definitions of crasseuse, ecrasseuse, l'ecrasseuse, it seems to be a general insult for a woman, "slimy" was one other definition I found and the "Fable" I ran across above is google translated as "a fat lady The Wretcher."
