McKinney / Allen / Plano Fiction Book Club
Classic Series Discussion Questions – June
The Sun Also Rises by Earnest Hemingway
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Now that you have read The Paris Wife and The Sun Also Rises, what
do you think of Hemingway? Do you want to read more of his work?
The Sun Also Rises, with its stress on nihilism and absurdity, is a study
in Existentialism. What qualities of Existentialism emerge in the text?
The Sun Also Rises is considered by most scholars to be an important
novel among all novels written by Americans. Do you agree? Did the
novel have universality for you. For example – did you read it as a
morality play (Everyman/ Jake vs. the war. ) If so, In what ways does
Jake win, and in what ways does the war win?
Describe the theme of the book in conjunction with Hemingway’s
writing style. Note the use of ‘and.’ His description of the landscape
is so vivid yet with a minimum use of adjectives. The last paragraph of
the book in tandem of a string of short, simple sentences. Did you
appreciate the style? Do you agree it complements the theme?
Discuss the problem of communication in the novel. Why is it so
difficult for the characters to speak frankly and honestly? In what
circumstances is it possible for them to speak openly? Are there any
characters who say exactly what is on their mind?
What technological innovations influenced the way people perceived
society and the individual’s place within it?
Drinking; sex; idle talk loaded with cleverness, irony, and pity; attacking Cohn --- a scapegoat; seeking out the noise
of crowds and ‘sophisticated’ scenarios… These become the modus operandi of a generation that is truly lost. How is
the novel representative of the Jazz Age and the age of the ‘Lost Generation?’
How does the experience of war shape the characters and their behavior? Examine the differences between the
veterans, like Jake and Bill, and the non-veterans, like Cohn.
What symbols were you aware of and what deeper meanings did they have for you?
 Jake’s wound (his impotence)
 Water (river, bathing, and the sea)
 Bulls and/or bullfighting
 The fiesta (pagan festival juxtaposed with religious festival)
How does Hemingway show that Jake is insecure about his masculinity?
The ‘Hemingway hero’ [some call him an ‘anti-hero’] has these attributes: a) he is doomed to be destroyed; b) he is
not, however, defeated because he maintains dignity while under duress; c) he never speaks of his angst. Using this
basic definition of the Hemingway hero, describe how Jake Barnes represents the typical Hemingway hero and
Robert Cohn does not.
What qualities do Jake and Cohn share with the rest of their acquaintances? Is it safe to call them both outsiders?
How does the fact that Jake went to war and Cohn did not make them different from each other?
Bill tells Jake that “sex explains it all.” To what extent is Bill's statement true of the novel The Sun Also Rises?
Why is Cohn verbally abused so often in the novel? Is it because he is Jewish? Explain. How does Cohn embody the
Jewish heritage of the tradition of alienation and suffering? How does that tradition of alienation and suffering
explain why Jake accepts Cohn when other characters do not?
McKinney / Allen / Plano Fiction Book Club
Classic Series Discussion Questions – June
The Sun Also Rises by Earnest Hemingway
16 Why does Mike attack Cohn but not Jake, whom Brett actually loves? Why does Cohn accept so much abuse?
17 How is Count Mippipopolous similar to Jake and his friends? How is he different? What is the effect of including a
character like the Count in the text?
18 What inferences can we as readers make about Hemingway’s point of view about non-Protestant Europeans? About
persons who do not practice Christianity?
19 Discuss the characterization of Lady Brett Ashley. Is she a sympathetic character? Is she a positive female role
model? Does she treat her male friends cruelly? In what ways do the male characters treat her cruelly? How do they
treat females in general in the text?
20 Brett personifies the mythological fertility goddess. Note how the festival goers worship her in the bacchanalian
frenzy. Eros is destructive. Cohn, Mike, Pedro are done in by Brett. Jake, because of his wound, is spared. Create an
analysis of Lady Brett Ashley as symbolic of the female gender according to the worldview of Hemingway.
21 Compare Jake's relationship to Brett with Cohn's relationship to Frances. How are the two relationships similar, and
how are they different? Why do you think that Hemingway create these two female characters so very differently?