One of the most predominate themes within Ernest Hemingway’s novel A Farewell To Arms, is the notion of life verses death. This discrepancy is repetitively highlighted by Hemingway’s use of the surrounding environment and natural occurrences. These events reflect back to the idea of sterility verses fertility, which, in context, directly correlate with the concept of life verses death. Even in the very last passage of this novel, Hemingway’s figurative use of key symbols portray the everlasting message of this epic piece of American Literature.

Right from the start, these symbols are introduced, establishing central themes that will be the backbone of the story. In these times of war, the perception of sterility and death sharply stand out against life and fertility. “The plain was rich with crops; there were many orchards of fruit trees and beyond the plain the mountains were brown and bare. There was fighting in the mountains and at night we could see the flashes from the artillery” (Hemingway, 1). This introductory synopsis describes the fruitful plains, uncorrupted by the destruction of the war. Past these fields however, where the war resides, is a mountainous landscape brown and barren, scarred by the devastations of war. Contrasting these two settings highlights the marked discrepancy between the fertility of the fruitful plains and the sterility of the mountains; hence life and death.

Using these themes and symbols, Hemingway also is able to create situational ironies, which contribute to the theme of life verse death. “…Gray leather boxes heavy with the packs of clips of thin, long 6.5 mm. cartridges bulged forward under the capes so that the men, passing on the road, marched as though they were six months gone with child” (Hemingway, 2). Masked by the fertile image of a pregnant mother, these men carry weapons of destruction and death. Intertwining false images of life with lethal arsenal produces the sense of a man-corrupted environment. The atmosphere of this environment has been created by the destruction of war entering and corrupting the areas of life.

On many occasions throughout the novel, the devastation of war has had great affects on the environment in which it resides. As troops marched through Frederic’s small Italian town, dust covered the trees lining the road. “The trunks of the trees too were dusty and the leaves fell early that year” (Hemingway, 1). Fall, the time of death, has now been produced by the destruction of military forces and not through natural means. War has replaced the task of Mother Earth, prematurely killing nature without thought.

Another key symbol that is a significant foil to the theme of death is rain. Rain, an occurrence in nature that commonly brings relief and life during spring showers after the long disparity of winter, in this novel represents death. During Frederic’s leave in Milan, Catherine expressers her fear of the rain. “I’m afraid of the rain because sometimes I see me dead in it” (Hemingway, 126). On countless circumstances, rain foretells death and is a predominant symbol in times of war. Dominated by the figurative use of both terms ‘rain’ and ‘sleep,’ the defeat at Caporetto represents death and disparity for the Italian forces.

Upon fleeing from the war to Milan these symbols of death continue to reoccur. Even after Frederic is reunited with Catherine the rains prevail as strong and frequent as ever. Far from the front, Frederic has still to escape the ubiquitous notion of death. Employing rain as a predominant symbol, Hemingway has portrayed death in times of war and is now able to transcend those aspects of war back to Frederic’s life away from the front. The theme of life verses death goes far beyond the front of war. Death creeps into the mortal life of each individual; the acrid reality of one’s existence.

Escaping Italy by boat to Switzerland, Frederic paddled, Catherine at the stern, enduring intermittent rainstorms. Bumping into boarder patrol in Switzerland, the couple entered the country perusing winter sport. The war and its aggression, dilapidated doctors and the sense of fear and ill fate had all been left behind in Italy. Their new neutral country was full of peace and fertility even as the winter progressed. As the seasons inevitably began to change, snow changed to early spring showers.

“In March came the first break in the winter. In the night it started raining. It rained on all morning and turned the snow to slush and made the mountain-side dismal. There were clouds over the lake and over the valley. It was raining high up in the mountain… we walked to the station under an umbrella, through the slush and the running water that was washing the ice of the roads bare” (Hemingway, 307).

Despite the natural occurrences described in this passage, Hemingway’s use of rain, symbolic of death, prevails. Clouds linger over the valley, the foreboding threat of rain. The roads had been washed “bare” by the precipitation. Similar barren conditions of the roads appear on account of the destructive military forces early in the story. “…And leaves, stirred by the breeze, falling and the soldiers marching and afterward the road bare and white except for the leaves” (Hemingway, 1). This passage, from the heart of the war in Italy, shares connotation with Frederic’s new life in Switzerland. In Switzerland, the rain has now symbolically replaced what was once done by marching lines of armed forces. The figurative affects and representations of rain still exist, omnipresent and insuperable.

Building up to and extremely predominant during the closing scene at the hospital, rain continues to fall. As rain pounds against the glass windows of the hospital, the baby is born dead and Catherine takes her last breathes. “After a while I went out and left the hospital and walked back to the hotel in the rain” (Hemingway, 332). Emotionally dead, Frederic juggles thoughts of life and death within his head. The death and sterility of war was not left in Italy and as Frederic has found.

In this novel, the main theme of life verses death is achieved through Hemingway’s use of sterility verses fertility. The surrounding environment and natural occurrences play in as foils to the theme and eventually the element of death prevails into Frederic’s life away from the war. Death has resided both within war and outside of it. Mortality is an inescapable constituent of life and the fertility of each human being’s existence is not to be taken for granted. Wherever you are, in combat or safely at home, the rain clouds of misfortune are of equal distance.