Francis Macomber

For most people it takes a life changing experience to come full circle and realize their full potential. That’s what happened to Francis Macomber in the short story “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber,” written by Earnest Hemingway. The story takes place in Africa where Macomber and his wife are on a Safari. At the beginning of the story he shows his timidity by running from the wounded lion, but at the end he shows his potential to be bold by going on the buffalo hunt, successfully making a kill on his own and by standing up to his controlling wife. In the story Francis Macomber starts out a coward that shows the talent to be very courageous.

The fact that Francis Macomber is a coward comes out before it is actually ever told. When Wilson says, “’You know in Africa no woman ever misses her lion and no white man ever bolts‘”(81), then Macomber replies, “’I bolted like a rabbit’” (81). It is evident from the start that he is not a man with much back...