Gil
This is unbelievable! Look at this! There's no city like this in the world. There never was.
I Inez
You act like you've never been here before.
Gil
I don't get here often enough, that's the problem. Can you picture how drop dead gorgeous this city is in the rain? Imagine this town in the '20s. Paris in the '20s, in the rain. The artists and writers!
I Inez
Why does every city have to be in the rain? What's wonderful about getting wet?
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Greetings and salutations. You’ll forgive me, I’ve been mixing grain and grappa. Now this is a writer, Gil, yes?
Gil
Gil Pender.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Gil Pender.
Ernest Hemingway
Hemingway.
Gil
Hemingway?
Hemingway
You like my book.
Gil
Liked? I loved, all your work.
Hemingway
Yes, it was a good book because it was an honest book, and that’s what war does to men. And there’s nothing fine and noble about dying in the mud unless you die gracefully, and then it’s not only noble but brave.
ZF Zelda Fitzgerald
Did you read my story? What’d you think?
Hemingway
There was some fine writing in it, but it was unfulfilled.
ZF Zelda Fitzgerald
I might have known you’d hate it.
Gil
Hi, Mr. Hemingway.
Ernest Hemingway
The assignment was to take the hill. There were four of us, five if you counted Vicente, but he had lost his hand when a grenade went off and couldn't fight as could when I first met him. And he was young and brave, and the hill was soggy from days of rain. And it sloped down toward a road and there were many German soldiers on the road. And the idea was to aim for the first group, and if our aim was true we could delay them.
Gil
Were you scared?
Ernest Hemingway
Of what?
Gil
Of getting killed.
Ernest Hemingway
You'll never write well if you fear dying. Do you?
Gil
Yeah, I do. I'd say probably, might be my greatest fear, actually.
Ernest Hemingway
It's something all men before you have done, all men will do.
Gil
I know, I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Have you ever made love to a truly great woman?
Gil
Actually, my fiancé is pretty sexy.
Ernest Hemingway
And when you make love to her you feel true and beautiful passion. And you for at least that moment lose your fear of death.
Gil
No, that doesn't happen.
Ernest Hemingway
I believe that love that is true and real creates a respite from death. All cowardice comes from not loving, or not loving well, which is the same thing. And when the man who is brave and true looks death squarely in the face, like some rhino hunters I know, or Belmonte, who's truly brave. It is because they love with sufficient passion to push death out of their minds, until it returns as it does to all men. And then you must make really good love again. Think about it.
Hemingway
[about Zelda]
She’ll drive you crazy, this woman.
F. Scott Fitzgerald
She’s exciting and she has talent.
Hemingway
This month it’s writing, last month it was something else. You’re a writer, you need time to write, not all this fooling around. She’s wasting you because she’s really a competitor. Don’t you agree?
Gil
Me?
Hemingway
Speak up for chrissake. I am asking, do you think my friend is making a tragic mistake?
Gil
I actually don’t know the Fitzgeralds that well.
Hemingway
You’re a writer. You make observations. You were with them all night.
FS F. Scott Fizgerald
Can we not discuss my personal life in public?
Hemingway
She’s jealous of his gift and it’s a fine gift, it’s rare. You like his work? You can speak freely.
Hemingway
You writing?
Gil
A novel.
Hemingway
About what?
Gil
It’s about a um…a man who works in a nostalgia shop.
Hemingway
What the hell is a nostalgia shop?
Gil
Y’know, a place where they sell old things, memorabilia. And, does that sound terrible?
Hemingway
No subject is terrible if the story is true, if the prose is clean and honest, and if it affirms courage and grace under pressure.
H Helen
It’s always the maid.
Gil
Would you read it?
Hemingway
Your novel?
Gil
Yah, it’s like 400 pages long and I’m just looking for an opinion.
Hemingway
My opinion is that I hate it.
Gil
You haven’t even read it yet.
Hemingway
If it’s bad, I'll hate it because I hate bad writing. If it’s good I’ll be envious and I’ll hate it all the more. You don’t want the opinion of another writer.
