The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

The first book I read by Ernest Hemingway was A Farewell to Arms. Right away I was hooked. I just can’t stop reading him. Or, I don’t want to stop. I’ve already put two more of his books on hold at the library. (Yeah…I did.) I don’t know what it is. By all accounts, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s writing is more descriptive, more provocative, more detailed — things I usually love in writing. But something about Hemingway just…flows.

My favorite character in The Sun Also Rises is Lady Ashley. I wouldn’t exactly call her a heroine. Actually she’s not a heroine at all. She’s more…a bitch. She calls herself that multiple times in the book, but I like her anyway. I admire her because she goes for what she wants, and she isn’t ashamed. Yet, everyone loves her. How could they not? She is British and her name is Brett. So cool, right? And her line, “What rot,” — I hope to some day pull off that phrase in conversation. The main character in the book, an American, even makes an observation that the British can say so much while saying so little. Everything is in the inflection of their voice. Oh, to be British…I’d probably be damn adorable if I were British. (Yes, that is how the narrator in this book talked, too. “It would be damn fine…The sun is damn bright today…This wine is damn good.” Another phrase that is purely inflection, yet I always knew exactly what the characters meant.)

The book starts in postwar Paris where we meet Jake, the narrator, Robert Cohn, and a whole cast of expatriates who have all fallen in love with Lady Ashley. But I wouldn’t call this a love story. It’s more of a drama? Historical fiction? A story about the “Lost Generation” as they call the expatriate writers and “newspapermen” of the day.

The story continues as the cast of characters from Paris take a trip to Pamplona to see the running of the bulls. The fiesta sets a perfect background for the drama that ensues. Even though Hemingway’s descriptions are sparse, I got a feel for what was going on at the fiesta. His focus on dialogue and action was helpful and allowed me to follow the characters and not get caught up in the atmosphere.

In both Paris and Pamplona, much of the conversation took place in cafes; I felt myself longing to sit with a book or magazine and people-watch as I sip a coffee in Paris. Oh, those were the days.

In doing a bit of research, I also learned that The Sun Also Rises is a roman à clef — a term used for a novel using fiction to hide real events. Much of what Hemingway describes actually happened. Somehow that makes me happy. It also makes me feel free, in a way — like, if I really wanted to, I could flee to Spain and enjoy days spent drinking, picnicking and people-watching. And that, in doing so, I would be searching for something authentic: authentic experience. I realize that despite their surface confidence and happiness, all of the characters in this novel were searching for something: love, perhaps friendship, perhaps a break from their normal lives. We all need those things, right? We just have different ways of going about finding them.