Hemingway’s Disappearing Style

Abstract

The publication of Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea in Life magazine, where it sold more than two million copies in 48 hours, capstones two midcentury debates about the proper format of literature (book or magazine) and the extent to which Hemingway's literary style--and modernism in general--have become synonymous with American popular culture. Simultaneously, the rise of television forces big magazines to conceptualize themselves as a “minor” form in 1950s media culture.