A Profile of Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea
“ It is a wonderful thing that Hemingway should have produced a work of such freshness at such a late stage in his career…” John Atkins
For Hemingway, all of 1952, from May to December, was taken up with The Old Man and the Sea, and Hemingway was loving every second of it.
In May Ernest heard from Leland and his lawyer, Alfred Rice, who was negotiating the Life deal, saying the magazine was prepared to publish the entire novel in a single edition during the first week of September, and would pay very well, which made Ernest worry, for a few minutes, about his taxes, and the money he still owed Scribner’s, who’d generously stumped up and paid Hemingway’s taxes on more than one occasion.
He then worried, for a few minutes, as to whether the Book of the Month Club — who had agreed to publish his next novel, whatever it was — would be happy with the Life deal. In fact they were very happy on the basis that all advance news, and serialisations etc, was good news, as it proved to be.
When Scribner’s sent Hemingway the proofs of the book’s cover design he was not pleased and telegraphed Adriana asking her to come up with a design, which she did, sending it both to Scribner’s and Ernest: both were delighted. It was a big break for Adriana’s career as a designer.
