In Our Time (short story collection) we are in hell." Hemingway conjures a world where "the weak are pitilessly exploited by the strong, and ... all functions of life ... promise only pain." Hemingway's semi-autobiographical character Nick Adams is "vital to Hemingway's career", writes Mellow, and generally his character reflects Hemingway's experiences. Nick, who features in eight of the stories, is an alter ego, a means for Hemingway to express his own experiences, from the first story '"Indian Camp" which features Nick as a child. According to critic Howard Hannum, the trauma of birth and suicide Hemingway paints in "Indian Camp" rendered a leitmotif that gave
Farewell to the mountains religion and divine providence, that is The Betrothed's "fil rouge" (the author writes that God disturbs his sons' joy to donate them, at the end, a bigger joy). Farewell to the mountains Farewell to the mountains or, in Italian, , is a famous passage of the VIII chapter of "The Betrothed" by Alessandro Manzoni. Lucia and Renzo are escaping from their native village by barge because don Rodrigo wants to force the young woman to marry him; Lucia sees the place where she used to live and the suitor's castle, so she grieves and begins to cry. Manzoni reports Lucia's