Book Home >> Famous Authors >> Nick Adams

Nick Adams

Nick Adams is the popular protagonist of more than a dozen of Ernest Hemingway's short stories written in the 1920s and 30s. Most of the stories were collected in a 1972 book titled The Nick Adams Stories. They are stories of initiation and adolescence. Taken as a whole, as in The Nick Adams Stories, they chronicle a young man's coming of age in a series of linked episodes. The character - Nick Adams - is partly inspired by Hemingway's experiences, from his summers in Northern Michigan to his service in the Red Cross ambulance corps in World War I. The story-arc and themes may have been influenced by Longfellow's The Song of Hiawatha. The stories are grouped according to major themes in Nick's life. 

Nick Adams is a renowned American author and short story writer whose works were published during the early 1920s. Adams' works encompass a broad range of topics and themes, reflecting on issues of morality, manhood, and power. Adams is perhaps best known for his fictionalized depictions of rural life and settings in the northern Midwest, often exploring themes such as a loss of innocence, adolescence, and death.

Adams was born on June 16, 1899 in Illinois. Growing up, he often spent time visiting his family in Michigan's Upper Peninsula,where he developed a lasting affinity for rural settings. After attending school, Adams worked in a number of odd jobs in the Detroit area before beginning to write. He published his first short story, "The Doctor," in 1922, and, from that point onwards, he wrote extensively, including writing for the New Yorker, Harper's Magazine, and other publications.

Adams is best remembered for his short story "The Killers," which was adapted to an Academy Award-nominated film in 1946. The story centers around two men attempting to kill a small-town boxer, and Adams' brilliant use of symbolism, foreshadowing, and tension add to the tragedy of the story. The story was adapted into an opera in 1962 and has since become a staple in the American canon. Many of Adams' other short stories, such as "The Revolt of Mother," "The Blue Hotel," and "The Hairy Ape," explore similar themes and reveal Adams's gift for capturing the nuances of the human experience.

Throughout his life, Adams struggled with alcoholism and eventually died of complications from cirrhosis of the liver in 1971. His works have been widely praised throughout the decades since his death, and many perceive him as a master of the genre.

Adams's keen insight into the human condition, and his ability to capture life's fleeting moments, still resonates with readers today.

Adams was a true pioneer of short story writing. His work serves as a reminder of the power of literature to capture life's complexities. While Nick Adams may no longer be with us, his work will live on for generations to come.

Nick Adams Stories

The Northern Woods

• Three Shots
• The Indian Camp
• The Doctor and the Doctor’s Wife
• Ten Indians
• The Indians Moved Away

Nick is around 6 1/2 in all of these stories

On His Own

• The Light of the World
• The Battler
• The Killers
• The Last Good Country
• Crossing the Mississippi

War

• Night Before Landing
• Nick sat against the wall ...
• Now I Lay Me
• A Way You’ll Never Be
• In Another Country

A Soldier Home

• Big Two-Hearted River
• The End of Something
• The Three-Day Blow
• Summer People

Company of Two

• Wedding Day
• On Writing
• An Alpine Idyll
• Cross-Country Snow
• Fathers and Sons (short story)