In Our Time

Chapter V

Summary

The narrator and others are setting up to execute cabinet ministers. Five of them stand quietly against the wall, amid the puddles and strewn leaves from a heavy rain. The final minister is suffering from typhoid and will not stand up. Finally, they decide to let him sit. He is sitting in the water when they fire the first round of bullets.

Commentary

This story is told in an even colder manner than the others. Hemingway drains his prose of any emotion or feeling. By doing so, the executions, with one sick minister, seem even sadder. After all, the narrator cannot even bring himself to engage in the act: he wants to separate himself from the event by discussing it as a distant phenomenon.