how to multiply intensities, and how to tell nothing but the truth in a way that allowed for telling more than the truth". The style is known as the Iceberg Theory because in Hemingway's writing the hard facts float above water; the supporting structure, complete with symbolism, operates out-of-sight. The concept of the iceberg theory is sometimes referred to as the "theory of omission." Hemingway believed that a writer could describe one thing, while an entirely different thing occurs below the surface. Baker calls Across the River and into the Trees a "lyric-poetical novel" in which each scene has an underlying truth presented via symbolism. According to Meyers, an example of omission is that Renata, like other heroines in Hemingway's fiction, suffers a major "shock"—the murder of her father and the subsequent loss of her home—to which Hemingway alludes only briefly. Hemingway's pared-down narrative forces the reader to solve connections—as Stoltzfus has written: "Hemingway walks the reader to the bridge that he or she must cross alone without the narrator's help." Across the River and into the Trees is constructed so that time is seemingly compressed and differentiated between present and past – as one critic says, "memory and space-time coalesce." To move Cantwell into the extended flashback, Hemingway uses the word "boy" as a bridge between time-present and time-past. The dialogue stays in the present tense, despite the time shifts, according to Stoltzfus, and the word "now" is repeated to "reinforce the illusion". Themes Cantwell, a 50-year-old military officer in love with the teenaged Renata, (whose name means "reborn"), is shown unlikeable as a character; one critic writes of him that his "lovemaking is described in terms of an infantry attack over difficult terrain". He is dying of heart disease and his relationship with Renata can be interpreted as a means of seeking youth or immortality. Hemingway biographer Jeffrey Meyers believes Renata represents the city of Venice, she "connected" Cantwell (and Hemingway) to Italy, and in her characterization Hemingway romanticized what may have been a father-daughter relationship and he says Hemingway probably used Cantwell's fictional relationship with Renata as a substitute for his own relationship with Adriana, who looked almost identical to Renata's description. Hemingway biographer Carlos Baker says Hemingway captured the theme of "the three ages of man," and in writing the book he finally objectified his own youthful traumatic war experiences. Baker sees a thematic parallel between