ERNEST HEMINGWAY
The Sun Also Rises
ABOUT HEMINGWAY
• Born July 21, 1899, Oak Park, Illinois
• Produced most works between 1920s and 1950s
• Published seven novels, six short story collections and two non-fiction
works
• Won Nobel Prize in Literature 1954
• Ambulance Driver, Italian Front WWI
• A Farewell to Arms (1929)
• Spanish Civil War, Normandy Landings, Liberation of Paris,
African Safari plane crash
• Awarded Bronze Star for bravery in WWII
• A 2009 book suggested during his time in China in 1941 he
worked for Soviet intelligence under the name “Agent Argo”
• Loved cats, had dozens of them when he lived in Cuba before
declaration of war by U.S.
HISTORICAL CONTEXT
• This book est. Hemingway, distinguished
• Based upon “Lost Generation”
• As young adults, spent youth during WWI, or Great War
• Hemingway in WWI
• Theme of pointlessness and futile search for meaning due to War
• Characters don’t really mention war, has effected their whole
lives thereon after
• “Yes, my dear. I have been around very much. I have been
around a very great deal.”
• Brett says, “Drink your wine, we’ve all been around. I dare say
Jake here has seen as much as you have.” (Pg. 66).
• Here, Brett implies things about the Great War.
Language and Literary Devices
• Symbolism, Imagery
• color and detail
• Bullfighting
• Water (fishing), tranquility
• Colloquial, in reference to time period
• Environment and social status
• “Across the square the white wicker tables and chairs of the Iruna
extended out beyond the Arcade to the edge of the street. Brett was
wearing a Basque beret. So was Mike. Robert Cohn was bare-headed
and wearing his spectacles.” Pg. 138
• “It was a beech wood and the trees were very old. The sunlight came
through the leaves in light patches on the grass. The trees were big,
and the foliage was thick but it was not gloomy. There was no
undergrowth, only the smooth grass, very green and fresh, a the big
gray trees well spaced as though it were a park.”
Character Analysis
Dialogue is a major technique that Hemingway uses as well as foreshadowing.
Jake Barnes:
• Narrator, implies things a lot throughout the book (sex)
• Typical member of “Lost Generation”, feels “inadequate” due to his injury.
• He gets the big picture of the Lost Generation but cannot escape it. He
understands the face of reality better than Cohn. “You can’t get away from
yourself by moving from one place to another.”
Robert Cohn:
• Has always felt like an outsider, copes using boxing (Princeton), nonveteran as
well
• He is very old school, unlike the others. His differences make him weak and
penetrable, leading to anxiety and mockery.
Lady Brett Ashley:
• Cohn regards her as, “A danger to Men”
• Charmer, strong independent woman who don’t need no man. Very
charismatic, known as a “danger” to men just being in their presence
• She doesn't’t follow traditional behavior of women of this time period
• Her limbo of relationships can relate to her relationship with the Lost
Generation; Her love died in WWI, she is now endlessly soul searching
Personal Reaction
• Dialogue is great
• “Lost Generation” and aimlessness
• Repetitive