Ernest Hemingway and The PCV

What Peace Corps Volunteer (before he was a PCV) met Hemingway in Spain when Ernie was writing The Dangerous Summer, the story of the rivalry of two great bullfighters–Luis-Miguel Dominguin and Antonio Ordonez?

That summer in Spain this young man approached Hemingway at one of the writer’s lengthy luncheon and asked him how to ‘become’ a writer. There is actually a photograph of the encounter, (it appeared, I think, in the old LIFE magazine) taken from a second-story balcony. It is a photo looking down on Hemingway at a long table of friends of the writer, and the young guy who would, in a few years, become a Peace Corps Volunteer. Who is this PCV?

Some hints:

1) He was a PCV in the 1960s;

2) A PCV in Latin America;

3) He later became a magazine writer;

4) He has a brother who was a PCV and CD for the Peace Corps;

5) He wrote a wonderful book about his father.

6) Hemingway wrote about him in an article about that summer.

If you get his name right, I’ll buy you a beer in DC at the 50th Reunion!

[His brother is not allowed to give the name!]

3 Comments

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  • Great question! You probably already have the answer by now. I needed all of your hints, but I have to conclude that it is People magazine’s Ronald Arias (Peru, 1963-64). His Moving Target: A Memoir of Pursuit is a biography of his father, Armando, who was a POW in North Korea. Ron Arias met Hemingway in Pamplona.

    Saludos,
    Rex Hudson (Bolivia, 1970-71)

  • I just made my 13th run with the bulls in Pamplona. I called it my “12th” to avoid superstition. Good run with the bulls playing their role pefectly. Saw them all dispatched in the afternoon “corridas.”

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