The Hemingway Story That John McCain Read Aloud to Me

Richard Fontaine: The death of political courage

McCain’s last filmed interview was for a documentary on the life and works of Hemingway, directed by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick. I attended a screening of the unfinished film a year after John died. He had been noticeably frail when the interview was filmed. But you couldn’t tell that from his appearance onscreen. There he was again, lively and engaging, forthright, expressing himself in the way he had of seeming wry and earnest at the same time. Though I knew it was coming, when he appeared in the film, it took me a little by surprise. There you are, old man. It’s good to see you.

McCain’s moments onscreen are moving. He pays tribute to his role model, Jordan. Near the end, commenting on Hemingway’s suicide and the life of the troubled soul who could be selfish and cruel, McCain was generous. “He was a human being,” he said, by which he meant someone who, for all his “many vices,” had used his art to understand mankind, and represent mankind, and take the side of mankind in battles against injustice. “And that, my friend, erases a whole lot of other what may be failings in life.” Just hearing him say “my friend” again, that old, familiar salutation, brought a lump to the throat.

The film reminded me of an experience more than a decade before, in October 2008, near the end of the presidential campaign he knew he was losing. We were a small party, gathered in his hotel suite in La Crosse, Wisconsin: the candidate and his wife, a few aides and traveling companions. It was an unusually early end to the afternoon. There was nothing more on his schedule until a town-hall meeting in a Twin Cities suburb later that evening, which would prove memorable when some of his supporters booed him as he defended Barack Obama from their attacks on his patriotism.

I picture us almost out of sorts, as if none of us knew exactly what to do with the time other than check BlackBerrys and cellphones. It was kind of a gloomy moment, despite the room’s cheerful view of the fall foliage along the Mississippi, which reminded me of the river town where I grew up. Ruminating about old times isn’t an activity much indulged in the last weeks of a national election, nor is feeling gloomy or unexpectedly idle or nostalgic. It’s all frenetic energy, bad diets, and stress. But I do remember the moment that way, a touch of autumn melancholy, an idle few hours, each of us occupied with our own thoughts.

Should we get something to eat? someone asked. Why not? “See what they have for room service,” the candidate instructed. I located a menu, which had photographs of the fare on offer. I started flipping through it and stopped when I came to the dessert page, and marveled at the confections pictured, pastries heaped with ice cream and whipped cream. “Oh, the short, happy lives of midwesterners,” I remarked, playing on Hemingway’s story “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber.” McCain smiled as he caught the reference.