During his life, Ernest Hemingway lived in marriage for 40 years, and married 4 times. His last love was Adriana Ivancic, a young Italian about whom so little is known. At that time, the writer was 50 years old, she was only 18. Their romance was platonic and lasted 7 years, over the years they wrote dozens of love letters to each other, playing with each other like a cat and a mouse.
Hemingway met Adriana in 1948 during a trip to Venice. At that time, he had already been in his fourth marriage for two years, so he could not openly show feelings for the girl who charmed him. And from the point of view of public morality, things were not the best way: she was good for him as a daughter.
The love correspondence between Ernest Hemingway and Adriana Ivancic was published only in 2011, later photographs were found from the writer's personal archive, which show that the couple appeared together in a circle of mutual acquaintances both in Cuba and Venice. By the way, the lovers also collaborated professionally: Adriana was a good artist and illustrated Hemingway's novels.
Historians are sure that the novel “Over the River, in the Shade of the Trees” is dedicated to Adriana: in the work, the novel is tied between a 50-year-old colonel and a 19-year-old countess from Venice. In order to somehow secure the honest name of his beloved, Hemingway made sure that his novel was published in Italy no earlier than two years after its publication. It is interesting that Adriana herself admitted in her memoirs that she became the prototype of the main character of the novel.
Adriana married Count von Rex while Hemingway was still alive. Two years later, he was gone, the writer committed suicide. And after 22 years, Adriana herself did the same, at that time she was 53 years old.
Literary critics call Adriana the writer's forgotten muse, they say that it was their relationship that inspired him, gave him creative energy. During the years of their communication, Ernest Hemingway wrote the work that brought him the Pulitzer Prize - the story "The Old Man and the Sea", Adriana created the cover for the first edition.
Another penpal romance broke out in between Ernest Hemingway and Marlene Dietrich … Their loving hearts also felt each other even at a distance.
