"Men Without Women" was a milestone in Hemingway's career. "Fiesta" hadalready established him as a novelist of exceptional power, but with theseshort stories, his second collection, he showed that it is possible, withinthe space of a few pages, to recreate a scene with absolute truth, bringingto life details observed only by the eye of a uniquely gifted artist.Hemingway's men are bullfighters and boxers, hired hands and hard drinkers,gangsters and gunmen. Each of their stories deals with masculine toughnessunsoftened by woman's hand. Incisive, hard-edged, pared down to the bareminimum, they are classic Hemingway territory.