Description

First published in 1926, “The Sun Also Rises” is Ernest Hemingway’s enduring novel of the Lost Generation and their directionless wandering through life in Europe following World War I. The novel centers around the frustrated love story between the protagonist, Jake Barnes, and the twice-divorced and sexually free Lady Brett Ashley. Jake was wounded in the war and is physically unable to consummate his love for Brett, while Brett is unable to decide what she wants in life and drifts from one relationship to another, afraid to be alone. Jake and Brett spend their time with other American expatriates living in Paris and the group of friends, dislocated by war and united in their dissatisfaction with their lives in America, seek out entertainment and distraction in a fishing trip and an adventure to Spain to see the bullfighting. The friends and lovers often fight amongst themselves while they spend their time drinking and wondering what to do next. The novel is written in Hemingway’s unique style and employs his “iceburg theory” of writing, which favored minimalism in descriptions that allowed a work’s deeper meaning to remain implicit. Widely hailed as one of Hemingway’s most significant novels, “The Sun Also Rises” remains a timeless and engrossing masterpiece of American literature.