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Sun Also Rises (Scribner Classics) (Hardcover) (Hardcover)
by Ernest Hemingway
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Classics, Fiction |
| Market price: ¥ 268.00
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¥ 248.00
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| MSL Pointer Review:
Written in Hemingway’s famously plain declarative sentences, this book is a quintessential piece of work on "The Lost Generation." |
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Author: Ernest Hemingway
Publisher: Scribner
Pub. in: June, 1996
ISBN: 0684830515
Pages: 224
Measurements: 9.5 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
Origin of product: USA
Order code: BA00453
Other information: Reprint edition
ISBN-13: 978-0684830513
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- MSL Picks -
The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway is a great novel that describes the life of Jake Barnes. Jake was a soldier in World War One and is now living out the rest of his life in France and Spain. Hemingway wrote this book as a critique on the lives of people in post World War One society. He describes the lives of the Lost Generation, those who fought and lived through the horrors of World War One. This review describes the background for The Sun Also Rises, summarizes the main points, and discusses the overall effect The Sun Also Rises has.
Hemingway wrote this book between 1924 and 1926, a few years after World War One ended. Many World War One Veterans came back from the war disillusioned. Life lost most of its purpose for the veterans after seeing so many die in such a brutal fashion. Hemingway is commenting on how World War One changed these people's lives for the worse. He does this through describing the lives of Jake and his friends.
The book opens with Jake and his friends living their lives like normal. They are writers living in Paris. Jake says, "Robert Cohn had two friends, Braddocks and myself. Braddocks was his literary friend" (5). Then Robert, Jake, and their friends Mike, Bill, and Brett travel to Pamplona, Spain to join in the fiesta of San Fermin. During the fiesta things start to go wrong for the friends. Everyone is drinking nonstop and this makes disagreements come to the front. Brett and Mike are engaged to be married but Robert Cohn wants to marry Brett, this conflict ends in a fight between Robert, Jake, and Mike. This happened during an argument, Jake describes, "I swung at him and he ducked. I saw his face duck sideways in the light. He hit me" (191). Near the end Brett ends up running off with a bullfighter named Pedro Romero. However, there is still more to the story in which you will have to read to find out how it ends.
This book does an excellent job of getting the point across that Hemingway was trying to convey. Hemingway does an amazing job of showing how terrible life is for the Lost Generation. The war has completely ruined Jake's life. Jake and Brett both love each other; however they cannot be together because of a war wound Jake received. At the end Brett says, "Oh, Jake, we could have had such a damned good time together" (247). Had Jake not been injured in the war he could have lived a happy life with Brett. Instead he just passes the time, either drunk or alone. After the fiesta of San Fermin, Jake went off by himself. He did not wish to stay with his friends. Instead his philosophy was "If you want people to like you you have only to spend a little money. I spent a little money and the waiter liked me" (233). He did not need true friends; people who were nice to him were all he wanted. Life had no purpose for Jake; he was just letting the days pass him by.
Hemingway writes with unparalleled precision. His characters come to life more when they are merely sitting at a bar or fishing in Spain than the characters of lesser writers do throughout the entire course of a novel. His environments are real and vivid. Additionally, his writing is so accessible that it is impossible not to be completely absorbed, the reader losing himself or herself in the swirling yet empty decadence of the 1920s ex-pat scene in Paris.
The Sun Also Rises is set in the decade after World War One, describes Jake's life, and does a great job of critiquing the lives of the Lost Generation. This is a great book that everyone should read. It does a good job of describing the impacts of war on the soldiers. This is definitely one of Hemingway's best novels and deserves to be read and remembered for years to come.
This great novel is among the best of Hemingway’s works. It has received more than 400 collectively positive reviews on Amazon.com. This novel promises an easy read and a mental escape for modern-day working professionals, who are struggling with workplace stress and anxiety. By the way, Hemingway is one of the best known American writers to the Chinese readers, and we will introduce into China all the major works by this legenday master of writings.
Target readers:
General readers
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Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) was one of the expatriate writers of Paris along with F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gettrude Stein, and others. He fought in the Spanish Civil War and wrote A Farewell to Arms and other stories on war and its unseen costs, including For Whom the Bell Tolls. Other titles by Hemingway include A Moveable Feast and The Sun Also Rises.
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From the Publisher
The Sun Also Rises was Ernest Hemingway's first big novel, and immediately established Hemingway as one of the great prose stylists, and one of the preeminent writers of his time. It is also the book that encapsulates the angst of the post-World War I generation, known as the Lost Generation. This poignantly beautiful story of a group of American and English expatriates in Paris on an excursion to Pamplona represents a dramatic step forward for Hemingway's evolving style. Featuring Left Bank Paris in the 1920s and brutally realistic descriptions of bullfighting in Spain, the story is about the flamboyant Lady Brett Ashley and the hapless Jake Barnes. In an age of moral bankruptcy, spiritual dissolution, unrealized love, and vanishing illusions, this is the Lost Generation.
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Chapter One
Robert Cohn was once middleweight boxing champion of Princeton. Do not think that I am very much impressed by that as a boxing title, but it meant a lot to Cohn. He cared nothing for boxing, in fact he disliked it, but he learned it painfully and thoroughly to counteract the feeling of inferiority and shyness he had felt on being treated as a Jew at Princeton. There was a certain inner comfort in knowing he could knock down anybody who was snooty to him, although, being very shy and a thoroughly nice boy, he never fought except in the gym. He was Spider Kelly's star pupil. Spider Kelly taught all his young gentlemen to box like featherweights, no matter whether they weighed one hundred and five or two hundred and five pounds. But it seemed to fit Cohn. He was really very fast. He was so good that Spider promptly overmatched him and got his nose permanently flattened. This increased Cohn's distaste for boxing, but it gave him a certain satisfaction of some strange sort, and it certainly improved his nose. In his last year at Princeton he read too much and took to wearing spectacles. I never met any one of his class who remembered him. They did not even remember that he was middleweight boxing champion.
I mistrust all frank and simple people, especially when their stories hold together, and I always had a suspicion that perhaps Robert Cohn had never been middle- weight boxing champion, and that perhaps a horse had stepped on his face, or that maybe his mother had been frightened or seen something, or that he had, maybe, bumped into something as a young child, but I finally had somebody verify the story from Spider Kelly. Spider Kelly not only remembered Cohn. He had often wondered what had become of him.
Robert Cohn was a member, through his father, of one of the richest Jewish families in New York, and through his mother of one of the oldest. At the military school where he prepped for Princeton, and played a very good end on the football team, no one had made him race-conscious. No one had ever made him feel he was a Jew, and hence any different from anybody else, until he went to Princeton. He was a nice boy, a friendly boy, and very shy, and it made him bitter. He took it out in boxing, and he came out of Princeton with painful self-consciousness and the flattened nose, and was married by the first girl who was nice to him. He was married five years, had three children, lost most of the fifty thousand dollars his father left him, the balance of the estate having gone to his mother, hardened into a rather unattractive mould under domestic unhappiness with a rich wife; and just when he had made up his mind to leave his wife she left him and went off with a miniature-painter. As he had been thinking for months about leaving his wife and had not done it because it would be too cruel to deprive her of himself, her departure was a very healthful shock.
The divorce was arranged and Robert Cohn went out to the Coast. In California he fell among literary people and, as he still had a little of the fifty thousand left, in a short time he was backing a review of the Arts. The review commenced publication in Carmel, California, and finished in Provincetown, Massachusetts. By that time Cohn, who had been regarded purely as an angel, and whose name had appeared on the editorial page merely as a member of the advisory board, had become the sole editor. It was his money and he discovered he liked the authority of editing. He was sorry when the magazine became too expensive and he had to give it up.
By that time, though, he had other things to worry about. He had been taken in hand by a lady who hoped to rise with the magazine. She was very forceful, and Cohn never had a chance of not being taken in hand. Also he was sure that he loved her. When this lady saw that the magazine was not going to rise, she became a little disgusted with Cohn and decided that she might as well get what there was to get while there was still something available, so she urged that they go to Europe, where Cohn could write. They came to Europe, where the lady had been educated, and stayed three years. During these three years, the first spent in travel, the last two in Paris, Robert Cohn had two friends, Braddocks and myself. Braddocks was his literary friend. I was his tennis friend.
The lady who had him, her name was Frances, found toward the end of the second year that her looks were going, and her attitude toward Robert changed from one of careless possession and exploitation to the absolute determination that he should marry her. During this time Robert's mother had settled an allowance on him, about three hundred dollars a month. During two years and a half I do not believe that Robert Cohn looked at another woman. He was fairly happy, except that, like many people living in Europe, he would rather have been in America, and he had discovered writing. He wrote a novel, and it was not really such a bad novel as the critics later called it, although it was a very poor novel. He read many books, played bridge, played tennis, and boxed at a local gymnasium.
I first became aware of his lady's attitude toward him one night after the three of us had dined together. We had dined at l'Avenue's and afterward went to the Café de Versailles for coffee. We had several fines after the coffee, and I said I must be going. Cohn had been talking about the two of us going off somewhere on a weekend trip. He wanted to get out of town and get in a good walk. I suggested we fly to Strasbourg and walk up to Saint Odile, or somewhere or other in Alsace. "I know a girl in Strasbourg who can show us the town," I said.
Somebody kicked me under the table. I thought it was accidental and went on: "She's been there two years and knows everything there is to know about the town. She's a swell girl."
I was kicked again under the table and, looking, saw Frances, Robert's lady, her chin lifting and her face hardening.
"Hell," I said, "why go to Strasbourg? We could go up to Bruges, or to the Ardennes."
Cohn looked relieved. I was not kicked again. I said good-night and went out. Cohn said he wanted to buy a paper and would walk to the corner with me. "For God's sake," he said, "why did you say that about that girl in Strasbourg for? Didn't you see Frances?"
"No, why should I? If I know an American girl that lives in Strasbourg what the hell is it to Frances?"
"It doesn't make any difference. Any girl. I couldn't go, that would be all."
"Don't be silly."
"You don't know Frances. Any girl at all. Didn't you see the way she looked?"
"Oh, well," I said, "let's go to Senlis."
"Don't get sore."
"I'm not sore. Senlis is a good place and we can stay at the Grand Cerf and take a hike in the woods and come home."
"Good, that will be fine."
"Well, I'll see you to-morrow at the courts," I said.
"Good-night, Jake," he said, and started back to the café.
"You forgot to get your paper," I said.
"That's so." He walked with me up to the kiosque at the corner. "You are not sore, are you, Jake?" He turned with the paper in his hand.
"No, why should I be?"
"See you at tennis," he said. I watched him walk back to the café holding his paper. I rather liked him and evidently she led him quite a life.
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An American reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-04 00:00>
I loved this book, and thought it a little bit strange. The characters are so completely detached from their lives, and the bullfight and fiesta serve as an antithesis to their monotonous fleeting lifestyles. Some of the characters were so downright strange, and almost fake, that it left me with a kind of empty helpless feeling.
First of all, the female character, Brett, is one of the most fascinating characters I have ever read about. Her mannerisms, and life choices are so interesting. She seems very beautiful, and I can see why everyone is is love with her. The male characters are also interesting, the main character being almost emotionless and accepting of his life, although he is in love with Brett, he is happy to just be her friend. You get the feeling that being hurt in the war has really changed him, and made him apathetic, and happy to live vicariously through the bullfight. The character of Cohn is also really interesting, and dark, although the descriptions of him seem a little anti-semitic in this day and age.
The descriptions of the bullfights, and the fiesta in Spain, are truly magnificent, and make me want to go to Spain and see the bullfights, even though I am a longtime vegetarian and animal lover! The descriptions were just that powerful. The character of the bullfighter is also a classic literary character, strong and attractive.
The prose of Hemingway is different than anything I have ever read, and I like it. He doesn't say much, yet he says a lot. By sticking to the simplicity of a situation, he manages to expose the depth that lies beneath. All in all, I loved this book, and I think it is relavent today, and can be related to anyone who lives their life fleetingly from pleasure to pleasure. A lot of drinking in this book!
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A reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-04 00:00>
Not many writers are like Ernest Hemingway. His style is unique and nobody will ever write like him. He is one of my favorite novelists ever and his The Sun Also Rises one of my most beloved books ever. I know there are some problems with the narrative - and there is animal cruelty that bothers me so much, but, still, this is one of the best books I have ever read.
The feeling I had when I first read The Sun Also Rises is impossible to compare to any other work. The vitality and joy of this story was what I liked most. Despite the fact that it is a sad story, I can feel life coming from every paragraph. The book deals with the “Lost Generation”, those youngsters who lost their dreams and hope with the First World War. Afterwards they were so displeased with life that their motto was "Live fast, die young".
The pages of The Sun Also Rises perfectly translate this momentum: every second counts, do it now, because in the future you may not be able to do again. This is the feeling that all the characters are after. The feeling of being fulfilled. However, it is not easy to find out what fulfils each person - so that is the reason why they make so many mistakes.
At some point, Bill, one of the most joyful characters of the book, says, "Our stay on earth is not for long. Let us rejoice and believe and give thanks.' This perfectly summarizes the point Hemingway is trying to state. This is what he believed by the time he wrote the novel - in the mid 20's. The Sun Also Rises is one of the books that best show the way the writer believed people should live. All things that Hemingway liked in his life were there, like beautiful women, boxing, fishing, bullfighting and traveling through Europe. This may not be the most appropriated lifestyle for many people, but it sure worked in Europe circa 1925.
Not many writers would be able to writer a book like that. If one thinks of the matter of the fact, The Sun Also Rises is almost a book about nothing. However it never let the reader feel bored. The characters' lives can be boring - they are bored most of the time. But the reader is fully immersed in that universe that he feels like part of the group. It is not hard to believe that Jake, Lady Brett, Bill, Cohn and the others are not our friends. They are so exposed to us - that in the end we know more about them then themselves. In the end, we know so much about life that we could expect from a book. And Ernest Hemingway is one of the few who can do that.
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Mary Sibley (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-04 00:00>
I sit writing this review from a beach chair. Since the day is gorgeous, I anticipate the sort of joy Hemingway celebrates. Among other things, he was a connoisseur of the natural world. He was also a connoisseur of the sorts of emotion experienced as one looks forward to an adventure. The book is dedicated to EW's first wife and his child. The first copyright is 1926, eighty years ago.
Robert Cohn boxed at Princeton to overcome feelings of inferiority and shyness. He fought only in the gym. In Paris he read books, wrote a novel, played tennis and bridge, and boxed. Robert went back to America with his novel. The publishers praised the work. Returning to France, Robert had become a very successful bridge player and had learned that women liked him. He asked Jake Barnes, the books narreator, to go with him to South America, having read W.H. Hudson. Robert Cohn became interested in Brett, Lady Ashley. Jake's head worked on old grievances. It was a rotten way to be wounded and it was a joke. Jake started to cry thinking he wouldn't have Brett. Brett is getting a divorce and she intends to marry Mike Campbell. At the Cafe Select Jake encounters Harvey Stone. In trying to begin his second book, Robert Cohn has lost his sureness. Jake begs Brett for them to live together. She says that it would not work.
Jake plans to shove off to Spain with Bill Gorton at the end of June. They are to go to the fiesta in Pamplona. Mike Campbell and Brett and Robert Cohn will also go to Pamplona. Robert Cohn, naive, brings out the worst in everybody. Jake admits to Bill that he has been in love with Brett, on and off, for a long time. The members of the party stay at the Montoya Hotel. Senor Montoya asks Jake if Bill is another aficionado. At Pamplona Jake is reading a story in THE SPORTSMAN'S SKETCHES. Jake hears Brett and Robert climb the stairs in each other's company. There is a big religious procession. San Fermin is transferred from church to church.
Pedro Romero, a new matador, is outstanding. He keeps a pure line facing the maximum amount of danger in the presence of the bull. It seems that Pedro Romero learned some English in Gilbraltar. Brett tells Jake she believes she is in love with Pedro Romero. Mike announces that Brett has gone off with the bull fighter chap. Later, summoned, Brett and Jake rendez-vous in Madrid.
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Hawley (MSL quote), USA
<2007-01-04 00:00>
After reading A Farewell to Arms for my literature class and enjoying it immensely, I decided to pick up another one of Hemingway's works. Unfortunately, I chose this one. Through most of the novel, I was bored. I felt like the characters were doing the same thing over and over again. Let's go have a drink. Now let's have dinner and walk around. Let's go drink some more. I just don't see how this novel warrants all the praise it has received. |
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