A Moveable Feast: The Restored Edition

The Sun Also Rises is the quintessential novel of the lost generation, written by a masterful member of that group about a number of friends and acquaintances who were utterly lost, and whose lives were mixed with death, and deaths mixed with life. The only woman in that group, namely Brett Ashley had lost the man she loved in the war before she met Jake Barnes, the narrator and central character of the book. This death, although only alluded to in the plot, seems to have had a strong impact on Brett, who was afterwards utterly lost, fleeing the death imbedded in her life by moving on from town to town, bar to bar, bottle to bottle, and from the arms of one man into those of another. Jake, too, is depicted in the act of fleeing the death in his life, which was afflicted on him by a war wound that made him impotent without annihilating his sexual desires. His love for Brett was, accordingly, deadly and hopeless. But instead of falling apart into disgraceful suffering as was the case of Robert Cohn, who loved Brett romantically and wanted to reform her, Jake rather abided by the Hemingway code; that is to say the acceptance of death's presence in life with admirable stoicism, the exhibition of grace under pressure, and making the best of one's situation. In a manner, the book also dwells on the remnants and broken pieces of the American Dream. The American characters of the book embodied no longer the ideals of such a doctrine. Jake whose life was shattered on account of the war was making his way with difficulty through the maze of a pointless existence. In this manner, the novel suggests the idea that the war had disrupted the unity of the American ideologies, which pointed formerly to the necessity of freedom, equality, and opportunity. The latter trait was crushed under the atmosphere of idleness which dominates the book and the fiesta-lifestyle of its characters. At the same time, however, the constant perseverance of Brett and Jake to preserve freedom and equality in spite of their conditions suggests a momentary break-up with the American Dream instead of a fatal breach. The lost generation was indeed lost, but Hemingway had founded his own code to deal with that.

he gets it. 3.5