Presidential Statement of the Day
By John F. Kennedy, statement on the death of Ernest Hemingway, 2 July 1961:
Few Americans have had a greater impact on the emotions and attitudes of the American people than Ernest Hemingway.
From his first emergence as one of the bright literary stars in Paris during the twenties–as a chronicler of the “Lost Generation,” which he was to immortalize–he almost single-handedly transformed the literature and the ways of thought of men and women in every country in the world. When he began to write, the American artist had to look for a home on the Left Bank of Paris. Today, the United States is one of the great centers of art. Although his journeys throughout the world–to France, to Spain and even to Africa–made him one of the great citizens of the world, he ended life as he began it–in the heartland of America to which he brought renown and from which he drew his art.