Questions for Hemingway

ESSAY PROMPTS AND RESPONSE THESE FOR THE SUN ALSO RISES.

PROMPT 1: Discuss the cultural, religious, and ethnic distinctions that pervade the conversations between Jake, Cohn, and Bill. How might these impact their relationships with one another?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. The cultural, religious and ethinic differences between Jake, Cohn, and Bill do effect how they Interact with eachother.

PROMPT 2: Discuss how men and women see, value, and use one another in the text. How does this impact your understanding of these characters and the cultures from which they come?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. The characters use one another for casual pleasure and nothing lasting. In the novel, there is an abundance of casual sex and frivoluse flirtin, like a giant game they are all playing with eachother. Brett, who is the permiscuase love maker in the book, is constantly seducing her friends, and the results are somewhat devastating to their group.
2. Men and women use, value, and see one another in The Sun Also Rises in many different ways. Jake and Brett have a weird relationship due to her slutty ways, and his loss of manhood.
3. Well I assume most men and women’s values are to honesty, trust, love, and happyness. Clearly the values of these men in this Novel are brutal and unclear.
4. In the novel The Sun Also Rises men and women use echother as objects to get what they want.
5. The men an women in The Sun Also Rises see eachother completely differently. There is onle one woman developed in the story and she is valued by men as a prized jewel, yet the way she treats men displays their value at slim to none. This implies that men from this Modernist artist culture idolize women, and the women use men to keep their self-esteem above the water line.


PROMPT 3: Discuss the differences in how our characters view the material world and the emotional world. How do they blur these distinctions? How do they keep them separate?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. The way our characters view these two worlds varies according to curcomstance and Religious/Ethnic background. The more pragmatic and cynical characters cut a very wide distinction Between the two, whereas those characters prone to a more Romantic and/or dreamy nature tend to mix the two together and show a distinct lack of ability when it comes to decerning which is affecting themselves at a particular time.
2. The characters are quite laid back and jobs do not appose me as stressors. It seems fishing is more important.
3. To the chacters in The Sun Also Rises, their material world and emotional world are constantly united. It’s almost impossible for any of them to do one thing regarding one world without the other world being drawn into it.

PROMPT 4: Compare Jake and Cohn. How does the fact that Jake went to war and Cohn did not make them different from each other? What qualities do they share with the rest of their acquaintances? Is it safe to call them both outsiders?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. Jake and Cohn both have led different lives, but somehow met and are friend now. Jake was a war veteran who lost more out of the war than he gained. Robert Cohn was a boxer, but did not like boxing. Cohn wasn’t treated equally or very nicely at the college he boxed at, Princeton. Along with the people they interact with they both get along with them differently.
2. Jake and Cohn disagree on many things but go about pursuing the same overall goal. However, their methods vary immensely, as their pasts influence how they act.
3. Jake and Cohn are very different characters, they both act differently and share a different view on how thing are and how things shoud be and happen.
4. Jake and Cohn are two very separate people in the novel who join up and become friends. It’s somewhat an obligated friendship, one that they know probably won’t last very long but they are willing to see where the friendship leads them. Their lives are very different, the only thing in which they have in common is that they like to play tennis. That’s where they met and began their friendship,
5. Jake and Cohn I belive are very much outsiders. Both of them seem to not fit in with the rest of the group. And givein the fact that Jake has gone to war and Cohn has not makes the two of them very different.
6. Jake and Cohn are in a very similar situation in society. They both have some odd underlying problem that sets them apart from the rest of their friends.

PROMPT 5: Bill tells Jake that “[s]ex explains it all.” To what extent is Bill’s statement true of the novel The Sun Also Rises?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. Bills statement though little more than a drunken whimsy at feirst cglance, is I Beilieve, the BackBone of this intire story. It is sex, love, and arder which lead the characters on theire different states of Being thought their gerney. Indeed it is Jacks lack of the nessesary Equipment to Preform this act which Allows him to Become Somwhat of A detached observer through which we may view And Analize how sex Affects the Behavior of his friends.
2. Sex plays a big role in the book, because it is the main factor in all the relationships. Jake cant have sex with Brett so their true love can’t really be anything. Romero is a young, hot boy so Brett is physically attracted to him.
3. Sex is the most prevalent theme in the novel The Sun Also Rises. Sex is what brings the characters together, and in some cases, what tears them apart.
4. Throughout The Sun Also Rises the quote “[s]ex explains it all” is used. One example is how Brett relates to it. Also it mixes with all of the mens emotions.
5. Bill tells jake that sex explains it all. This is very much true for the whole book. Sex is a re-occuring theme in the novel. Some characters in the novel take advantage of people, some manipulate others to get their way.
6. JAKE AND BRETT ARE EMOTIONALLY MORE THEN FRIENDS; PHYSICALLY IS A DIFFERENT STORY. BOTH HAVE DEEP FEELINGS FOR ONE ANOTHER BUT WHEN JAKE RECEIVED HIS WAR WOUND HE WAS, FROM THEN ON, UNABLE TO FULFILL A SEXUAL DESIRE BRETT HAD. IT SEEMS, AT TIMES, THAT BRETT EARN’S FOR JAKE AND ONLY WANTS HIM BUT IS UNWILLING TO COMMIT. “OUR LIPS WERE TIGHT TOGETHER AND THEN SHE TURNED AWAY AND PRESSED AGAINST THE CORNER OF THE SEAT… ‘DON’T TOUCH ME,’ SHE SAID.” WITHOUT HIS ABILITY TO HAVE SEX SHE CANNOT EVEN KISS HIM. NOT ONLY DOES THIS LOWER HIS SELF ESTEEM, BUT, IT ENABLES HIM FROM HAVING A RELATIONSHIP WITH THE PERSON HE LOVES THE MOST.
7. In the novel, The Sun Also Rises Bill is almost right when he tells jake “sex explains it all.” Bill, like many others, possibly is unaware that a certain extent of Jakes manhood was lost during the war.
8. Bill’s statement, “sex explains it all” is quite relevant to the situation that jake finds himself in this novel. Many parts in the novel make reference to the fact that Jake was wounded in the war, and lost both of his testicles. It is possible that this is why Brett has an off-on relationship with him. Perhaps she is only willing to stay committed to him because he is incapable of having sex. So she may like him, but she seems more keen on what she can get out of him. If she truly wasn’t a shallow person, she would probably be marrying Jake rather than Mike.

PROMPT 6: 
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?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. Lady Ashly has the least depth of all the characters in The Sun Also Rises, she is as shallow as a wash bin and just about as complex. She characterizes the selfish stooped and flertasheous pleasure driven, responsibility deprived part of our society. Her only life goal is self fulfillment, her lifes meaning is to seek attention frome others. Whenever things seem not to be going her way, our when her actions lead her astray, she behaves like a small spoiled child and seeks solace frome her male friend Jake, she expects him to bow to her evry whim but refuses to except his true love, because true love is beyond her understanding and is thus an unknown quantity, and as such it terrifies her.
2. Lady Brett Ashley symbolizes the undisciplined, spoiled aspects of society. Everything she embodies is for the worse in the novel. She takes advantage of all her counterparts and proves her upbringing was very unsuccessful.
3. Throughout the novel you see two sides of Lady Brett Ashley. The first is that she actually cares about the people around her and want to be a good person. The second side is her using everyone around her to benefit herself. Each of these sides goes along with what other character she is with during a particular moment.
4. Lady Brett Ashley is a tart. She goes after men and has sex with them and then they provide for her. She actually is the most unsympathic character in the whole story. She uses men then discards them once they are of no use to her. She is a spider, trapping men in her web and traps them there. As Cohn says she is Circe, who turns men into swine. By turning them into lower creatures, she uses them and then kills them at the opportune moment.
5. Lady Brett is not a sympathetic character. All of h friends are talking about all the things there going through and she is like “I don’t care, lets drink.” Lady Brett is also not a very good role model for anyone because she acts uncaring to people and she drinks a lot.
6. Lady Brett Ashley has her own ideas and for the most part, does what she desires. She yearns for Jake, while he does the same, but knows that she could never be happy with him. She is a very independent woman that many women strive to be like her, but she also has some problems of her own.
7. Brett is not a very positive female role model. She likes two different guys, sleeps with them and uses bad language. In chapter seven-teen, the reader realizes that Brett is a slut. She was in many relationships at the same time. She slept with Jake, Cohn, and bullfighters. You realize that Brett isn’t an inoscent character.
8. I believe Brett is a tramp and a horrible positive role model. She is a role model for bad behavior and scandalous actions. That is all.
9. Jake, Mike, Cohn, Bill and Romero are all men that lady Brett Ashley plays around with. She does not have very good communication with any of them so it makes things very complicated between all the men. Throughout the book she is with several different men, she gives them all reasons to believe they are important.
10. Lady Brett Ashley is compassionate when things are beyond what she can control. Brett has slept with almost every main character of the book and takes it upon herself to make them feel better, mostly with the consuption of wine. Lady Brett Ashley is to mary Michael at the same point in time she runs off with Pedro Romero and Cohn. Brett drinks as much as the men if not more, and smokes cigars and cigarettes, not typical of women in the 1920’s.
11. Lady Brett Ashley is a beautiful women that men are instently attracted to. Her present are always welcomed.
12. Lady Brett Ashley, a character in The Sun Also Rises, is not a sympathetic character, nor a positive female role model. From what we see of her in the novel, you get the idea that she does what she wants in terms of what would be best for her. When I say “best,” though, that means “what will be most benefitial/fun” for her at the time.
13. There is one woman in the novel The Sun Also Rises that is worth mentioning. The main characters consist of all men, and the woman is formally known as lady Brett Ashley and her treatment of the people (men) around her shows the romanticism and selfishness that make up her character.
14. HEMINGWAY WRITES IN HIS OWN, INDIVIDUAL WAY. HE CARRIES ON CONVERSATIONS OF WHICH IF YOU DO NOT FOLLOW YOU WONT KNOW WHO IS TALKINGOR WHAT ABOUT. NOT ONLY IS HIS WRITING UNIQUE, HIS CHARACTERS ARE INTERESTING AS WELL. ONE OF WHICH, LADY BRETT ASHLEY, SEEMS TO ALWAYS STEAL THE ATTENTION; EXPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO MEN.
15. Lady Brett Ashley is one of the most emotionally confused characters in the whole book. She falls in “love” with Mike then has an affair with Cohn in San Sebastion whil in the mean time is crushing on Jake.
16. Lady Brett Ashley is a very independent woman and she can’t make a commitment. She leads any boy on but only truly loves Jake, whom she can’t love.
17. Lady Ashley, also known as Brett, is a very self-centered, wild, free-living alcoholic. She stoops from one man to the next, when she really love only one man. Jake is the man she is in love with, but as you can very easily tell she’s not ready to settle down. Plus her hormones must still be raging, since she sleeps with a guy like Cohn, to a guy like Rimero. As a role model Brett is not the best.

PROMPT 7: Read closely and analyze one of the longer passages in which Hemingway describes bulls or bullfighting. What sort of language does Hemingway use? Does the passage have symbolic possibilities? If the bullfighting passages do not advance the plot, how do they function to develop themes and motifs?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. Bull fighting is described as a great passion for jake and his friends. In a sense, this passion often seems to reflect upon the actions of the characters in the story. At one point Robert is compared to a steer. Mike compares Cohn to a steer because he never says a word but is always “hanging about”, like a steer. Since Cohn became involved with Brett, he was unable to leave her alone, and constantly trailed behind her, following her everywhere.

PROMPT 8: 
Analyze the novel in the context of World War I. How does the experience of war shape the characters and their behavior? Examine the differences between the veterans, like Jake and Bill, and the nonveterans, like Cohn and Romero.

RESPONSE THESES:

1. The differences between the veterans and the nonveterans in The Sun Also Rises is quite apparent. Everything about the characters, like their behavior, is shaped based upon whether they fought in World War I or not.
2. In the novel The Sun Also Rises, the characters who went to war seem to be more content than the characters who didn’t go to war.
3. World War I was one of the bloodiest and most devastating wars the world has ever seen. It changed the lives of almost everyone who was involved, and made them look at the world in a different way. Jake and Bill have a much harder time expressing their desires, but people like Cohn sometimes feel guilty, and even a little jealous that they did not experience the war.
4. War changes people. It effects them emotionally to the point where there no longer considered to same person.


PROMPT 9: Why is Cohn verbally abused so often in the novel? Is it because he is Jewish? Why does Mike attack Cohn but not Jake, whom Brett actually loves? Why does Cohn accept so much abuse?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. Cohns actions irritates most of the people he is around. No one really likes him but puts up with him. When everyone gets drunk however, true feelings come out.
2. Cohn is an abused character, in the book because as it says at the beginning of the book that he felt inferiority and shyness from being treated as a Jew at Princeton. So to let out his anger he learned to box and that gave him comfort, knowing that he could knock out anyone who would tease him.
3. Cohn is often verbally abused in the novel because he is jewish, and because of his involvement with Brett. Jews were looked down upon at the time, and since Cohn was one, he received quite a bit of hostility at certain times.
4. Throughout the novel, Cohn acceps much abuse from Mike. Cohn accepts this verbal abuse because he believes he loves Brett and is willing to take anything for her.
5. In the novel Cohn is verbally abused and I think it is because the other men are so insecure about themselves they feel that ruining someone elses self esteem will help them get out their insecurities. The fact that Cohn is Jewish is a excuse and it gives them a reason to abuse him.
6. Throughout the story lady Ashley (Brett) has been with many men. Some she has went away with, such as Robert Cohn. While some she has been seen with through most of the book, such as the Count and Michael. For some reason though Cohn has been picked on and treated as if he wasn’t wanted on their trip down to Pamplona. To the fiesta and to see the bull-fights. Michael gets very annoyed and jealous with Cohn and things get a little twisted.
7. Throughout the novel Mike repeatedly attacks Robert Cohn on his love of Brett. In the first section of the book, before Mike has been introduced into the novel, Jake talks a lot about his love of Brett. But each time he does it is either to himself or to Brett herself, never openly in public.
8. In the novel The Sun Also Rises, there are many varied characters, not the least of which is Cohn, the slightly pompus Jewish boxing champ who seems to be somewhat slow-witted at times. During the novel Cohn always seems to be at the end of all his friends jokes, and he is constantly after Brett, the girl he had a short relationship with. Brett more than anything is why he is verbally abused so much.
9. The verbal abuse that Cohn receives and endures is because he is Jewish and partly because of his feelings towards Brett.
10. Cohn is not verbally abused throughout the novel because he is Jewish. Rather, it is because he brings the characters, who are in a sort o alternate reality back to reality. Being Jewish is only the excuse to get mad at him for try to achieve real happiness. Mike attacks Cohn and not Jake because he is not threatened by Jake but feels that Cohn could take Brett away from him.


PROMPT 10: 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? If so, how are these characters similar to each other?

RESPONSE THESES:

1. Communication is something people do as a living. The Sun Also Rises is full of communication that dances around the point someone is trying to make. Truth is not always the easiest thing to tell or hear; lying, however, can make a situation easier and complex at the same time.
2. The characters have such a hard time communicating because they are so bent on being miserable and so incase themselves within their own little walls. The only time they do speak what is on their mind is when they are drunk or otherwise intoxicated. This is how Mike yells at Cohn, he is so drunk his walls are lowered and all of his anger and jealousy is aimed squarely at Cohn. Even when Jake is alone with Brett they pretend that they can never be together even though they are in love. They just are so stuck in their persons that they can’t do what should be done. The only other person in the book who does or says exactly what he is thinking is Cohn, who hits Jake that night because Brett loves him.
3. The characters in the novel have a strong lack of communication. The lack of communication is started because of Lady Brett and her fooling around. When her and Cohn have an affair is when the friends start falling apart because they are trying to keep it a secret from Mike. If all of the characters were to speak honestly then their secrets would be exposed.