A Farewell to Arms begins in the Alps around the frontier between Italy and present-day Slovenia. Allied with Britain, France, and Russia against the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Germany, Italy is responsible for preventing the Austro-Hungarian forces from assisting the Germans on the war’s western front, and Russia in the east. The novel’s narrator and protagonist is eventually identified as Lieutenant Frederic Henry, an American who has volunteered for the Italian army because the United States has not yet entered the war.... More
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