Ernest Hemingway responds to Star publisher Mark Zieman

Dear Mr. Zieman:

In 1929, I published these words in my novel A Farewell to Arms:

“We won’t talk about losing. There is enough talk about losing. What has been done this summer cannot have been done in vain.”

Zieman, you talk too much about losing. Winners don’t beg for love the way you did in your front-page letter to readers on Sunday. Your talk of business models is a coward’s prayer. I was at D-Day and I mucked Marlene Dietrich. Don’t talk to me about penetration. You are a boy.

In the summer you laid off some and in the fall you undid more and in the late fall your simple pattern got done. Now you speak my name and you say you cannot have done these things in vain. But you have already lost. Was it worth it, Zieman?

I liked the paper in the morning.