LARPing Hemingway

How a desire to compensate for my embarrassingly comfortable childhood spurred my drinking

Hemingway was a hard-drinking, hard-living kind of guy. But, some of his biographers have suggested that his full-throated masculinity was the result of overcompensation.

Hemingway’s mother, who desperately wanted twin daughters, dressed young Hemingway as a girl, photographing him multiple times alongside his sister. The proponents of the overcompensation theory suggest that Hemingway felt a need to project a manly image to cover up the embarrassment of being photographed as a girl.

According to his biographers, the need to hide his embarrassment compelled him to run with the bulls in Pamplona and brag about his prowess as a boxer. These activities—and the macho themes of his writing—were designed to camouflage his humiliating past.

#MeToo, Hemingway

I can relate to Hemingway’s embarrassment. As a person who grew up in an incredibly safe and middle-class suburb outside of Grand Rapids, Michigan, I also developed an insecurity about my upbringing. Mine had nothing to do with being photographed in feminine dresses. I felt humiliated by my comfortable and vanilla upbringing.

I admired anybody who grew up anywhere but Grand Rapids, Michigan. I especially admired writers, musicians, and artist types who possessed a gritty, depressed authenticity.

Sure I could claim a little bit of street cred. My dad wasn’t Ward Cleaver. But at the end of the day, my dad sold commercial real estate and went to church twice every Sunday. He paid for my private schooling— and I never once experienced hunger as a child. How humiliating for me!

My substance-using heroes: Johnny Cash, Shane MacGowan, Charles Bukowski, Mike Watt, and Lou Reed.

In my drinking days, I longed to be like the Johnny Cashes, the Tom Waitses, and the Shane MacGowans of the world—guys with three livers and a hardscrabble back story.

My taste in writers was similar. I preferred profane writers who lived in dilapidated parts of town. Charles Bukowski. Jim Harrison. Raymond Chandler. And of course, Hemingway. As an adolescent alcoholic, I wondered if I could ever be as edgy as they were. Could I miss a meal, live in a slum, and smoke filterless cigarettes? The answer was, “Yes, if only in my (alcohol-fueled) dreams.”

With booze goggles firmly affixed, I was able to forget about my freckle-faced, midwestern childhood and wear a more dangerous persona. Imagine the looks of wonton lust I got from women as I—very drunkenly—misquoted half-remembered Philip Larkin poems—poems that contained a cussword and references to pre-marital sex!

Live Action Role Playing (LARPing)

The internet has created a word that might be useful here: LARPing. LARPing is a type of interactive role-playing game in which the participants portray characters through physical action, often in costume and with props.

I was LARPing alcoholic writers and musicians. And it made me look ridiculous. I have always been—and will always be— a boring middle-class Hollander.

But perhaps I am not the only insecure young man who confused drinking unwise amounts of liquor with being an interesting and noteworthy person.

I wonder what my readers think of this theory of mine. Do you see examples of people LARPing in their addiction?