Since 1992, the Ernest Hemingway Foundation and Society has awarded Jim & Nancy Hinkle Travel Grants to defray travel expenses for graduate students attending its biennial international conferences. Participants must be planning to present a paper at the Hemingway Society conference; enrolled in a graduate degree program and making progress toward their degree at the time of their initial application; present at the conference and members in good standing of the Hemingway Society at the time of the award.
Graduate Students are automatically considered for a Hinkle Grant based on their abstract submission and indication of Graduate Student status in their brief bio submitted as required by the Hemingway Society Call for Papers. For fullest consideration, grad students should indicate their grad status in their biographical statement, providing the name of their institutional affiliation, degree sought, and expected completion date.
Graduate Student abstract proposals are reviewed by no fewer than three members of the Travel Grants Committee and are evaluated on the following criteria: clarity, originality, and value in furthering Hemingway scholarship, criticism, and/or instruction. Although we will consider proposals from previous Hinkle winners, applications from students who have not won before will be given priority consideration. Committee members who supervise graduate students applying for Hinkle grants will recuse themselves from evaluating their own students' proposals.
Winners will be notified of their award status by January prior to the upcoming conference. Checks will be distributed to recipients at an award ceremony at the conference. Recipients must be present to receive the award.
JIM HINKLE, 1924-1990
The Hemingway Foundation and Society established and began awarding the James C. Hinkle Travel Grant in 1992 to honor the memory of Hemingway and Faulkner scholar and beloved San Diego State University professor, Jim Hinkle. An expert on Hemingway’s humor, Jim was legendary for his meticulous attention to the details of Hemingway’s texts and for his ability to recite The Sun Also Rises by heart and without dropping a line. He was the author of Reading Faulkner: The Unvanquished: Glossary and Commentary (UP of Miss.) and many important articles on Hemingway and Faulkner. His essay “What’s Funny in the Sun Also Rises,” is considered a classic in the field.
“There was never a man with a longer list of questions. And years of methodical and scrupulous research had provided him with a list of answers nearly as long…. Ever vigilant, Jim felt his most valuable contribution as a critic and a teacher was knowing–as he read–what he didn’t understand. And for him that’s where the fun began. Determined not settle for approximate readings or shrug off troublesome ‘minor’ passages, Jim was nearly messianic in getting everyone involved in constructing meaning–though he never would have framed it that way.
He was fond of asking teachers of Sun who kicked Jake’s leg in an early scene in the novel. Invariably he would get different responses–it’s Frances; no it’s Robert. And if you had a doubt, even for a moment, he had you. Because Jim’s talent was contagious: by teaching us all that until we’d worked every particle of a sentence through, chased every connection down, what we assumed was only that–assumption. Essentially he taught reading….”
–Dawn Trouard, Faulkner Journal
Dawn Trouard's full tribute
Nancy Hinkle, 1927-2005
Nancy Hanks Hufstader Hinkle, wife of Hemingway and Faulkner scholar James C. Hinkle and longtime member and friend of the Hemingway Society, was every bit the scholar and intellect as her husband, often proofreading his work. Upon the death of her husband, Nancy and her seven children helped to create and fund the James C. Hinkle Award, which has helped dozens of graduate students to attend the Society’s international conferences. To honor Nancy’s memory, in 2005 the Hemingway Society renamed the James C. Hinkle Award to be the Jim and Nancy Hinkle Award.