Ernest Hemingway’s “A Very Short Story” portrays Love and Loss in the setting of Italy during World War I. Hemingway’s spare, direct prose style and emphasis on existential themes are hallmarks of modernist literature and of the style and tone of Lost Generation art. The story explores themes of love, betrayal, and The Effect of War on Relationships, and is set initially in an army hospital, which serves as a symbol of the emotional trauma and devastation that the war causes the characters. It is a place where lives are saved but relationships are doomed. Issues of time, space, and the war itself work to destroy the intimacy and healing represented in the first part of the story, replacing them with a destructive sense of melancholy, despair, and loneliness.

One of the major themes of the story is The Effect of War on Relationships. The war both brings the soldier and Luz together and plays a key role in pulling them apart. The soldier’s return to the front creates distance between them and prevents them from communicating with each other; the soldier receives 15

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