The day Hemingway liberated the Ritz bar in Paris
(Artdaily.org)

Even for Ernest Hemingway, a man whose bravado was matched only by his thirst, his liberation of the Ritz Hotel`s bar in Paris was the stuff of legend. Officially the Nobel prize-winning author of `A Farewell to Arms` and `The Sun Also Rises` was supposed to be a war correspondent for the American magazine Collier`s when he entered the French capital on August 25, 1944. In reality, the macho novelist, who strode from a commandeered Jeep with all the swagger of a general to take over the city`s most luxurious hotel, was waging his own swashbuckling private war against the Third Reich. Having survived World War I and the Spanish Civil War -- where he similarly blurred the lines between reporter and combatant -- Hemingway managed to get himself embedded with the US 4th Division troops that landed