The Killers by Ernest Hemingway

Burt Lancaster is fantastic as the ' Big Swede.'

My favorite Hemingway works are memorable for their emotional power—his ability to strip away sentimentality while still delivering deep, resonant themes. He uses restraint to create tension, allowing what’s unsaid to hit harder than what’s on the page. But The Killers doesn’t quite land that way. I usually appreciate his “less-is-more” style—it’s clean, sharp, and has influenced generations of writers. But sometimes, it feels like he’s trying a little too hard to be, well… Hemingway. 

To be honest, I found this story incredibly dull. It didn’t pull me in, left me indifferent, and the casual racism? Yeah, that didn’t help either. It all just felt dated and unnecessary. I vaguely remember reading this story years ago, but what really sticks in my mind is the Burt Lancaster movie adaptation—because it’s so much better.

Like a lot of Hemingway’s work, there’s no real “plot,” just plenty of ambiguity and dialogue, leaving the reader to connect the dots. That can be brilliant when there’s enough substance to justify it but in this story there just isn’t enough going on to make the effort worthwhile. 

The story drops the reader immediately into the action: two hitmen arrive in a small-town diner, waiting to assassinate an ex-boxer, Ole Andreson. He is also referred to as the 'Big Swede.' The dialogue is clipped, the setting is bleak, and the threat of violence looms. This should be classic Hemingway territory—terse, charged with underlying emotion. But instead of building towards an emotional punch to the gut, the story just fizzles out.

Unlike Hills Like White Elephants or A Clean, Well-Lighted Place (both appear in my Short-Story Hall of Fame) where the unspoken emotions simmer beneath the surface, The Killers feels hollow. We don’t get a real sense of Ole Andreson’s despair, nor do we feel the weight of his fate. The ambiguity, which can be so powerful in Hemingway’s best stories, feels more like a shrug here. There’s no deeper connection to the characters or their emotions—it’s just a series of clipped exchanges that don’t add up to much.

In the end, The Killers lacks that haunting, lingering effect that makes Hemingway’s best work so powerful. That being said, his influence on modern short fiction is undeniable, and when he’s good, he’s really good. But he’s also capable of delivering some duds, and for me, The Killers is a total misfire by Papa Hemingway. 

You can read this story HERE.