A Farewell to Arms Characters

Frederic Henry runs the show, and the past, in A Farewell to Arms. And he does it from the future – his future, anyway. The good news is, Frederic doesn’t need a fancy time machine to g...

In the 1970s and 80s, critics Judith Fetterly and Millicent Bell argued that the character of Catherine in A Farewell to Arms helps prove that Ernest Hemingway was sexist and a misogynist: in sho...

The baby doesn’t seem like much of a character. He acts as both a marker of time in the novel, and as a source of deep confusion and conflicted emotions.Let's start with time. Catherine is th...

Rinaldi, the surgeon at the Red Cross Hospital, is important to the novel not only because he gets some really great lines, but also because he is of ambiguous sexual orientation. He sleeps with fe...

Why doesn’t the priest get a name? Is it because he’s supposed to be a generic priest? Not likely. This is a very specific priest. We know where his family lives. We know where he’...

A man who is ninety-four years old. He’s a friend of Frederic’s and only appears once in the novel. Frederic says, "He was living to be one hundred years old" (35.13). Some critics clai...

The captain that eats with Frederic at the Red Cross Hospital, and who taunts the priest about religion and sexuality.

Frederic’s friend and fellow ambulance driver during the retreat. He helps Frederic kill a soldier, and then is shot shortly thereafter.

Catherine’s friend. She’s a parental figure to Catherine and is very protective of her.

Miss Walker is the nurse on duty when Frederic arrives at the hospital in Milan.

She might be in love with Frederic. We first hear Frederic’s first name when he reveals it to her in the Milan hospital. She is only in the novel during the Milan hospital scenes.

An older woman in charge of the Milan Hospital. She and Frederic don’t get along, and she has his leave revoked when she thinks he’s sick on purpose.

A singer studying in Milan. He gives Frederic his clothes in Milan before Frederic goes to Stresa.

The surgeon who operates on Frederic’s knee.

Is in the Milan hospital with Frederic. His eyes were wounded on the battlefield.