Ernest Hemingway won the Nobel Prize in 1954.  Unfortunately, he was unable to attend the award ceremony because he was recuperating from injuries sustained as a result of an airplane accident.  This, in and of itself, is Hemingwayesque, and the irony was certainly not lost on the U.S. Ambassador who read the acceptance speech that the prize-winning author prepared.

What follows is the most oft quoted part of the acceptance speech.

Writing, at its best, is a lonely life. Organizations for writers palliate the writer’s loneliness but I doubt if they improve his writing. He grows in public stature as he sheds his loneliness and often his work deteriorates. For he does his work alone and if he is a good enough writer he must face eternity, or the lack of it, each day.  [Read more…]