Book Report

As I mentioned earlier, one of Larry's goals for retirement has been to read more. He wanted to try a few American classics. First he started with Faulkner's Sound and Fury and hated it. Then he decided to try Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises. He wasn't much crazy about that one either. I volunteered to read the Hemingway novel to see if I would like it. This is my book report. I figure it's only been about 40 years since I had to write one, so it wouldn't kill me to try it again. Here it goes. My form will be freer than in high school. It's my blog, I can use whatever format I want!

The Sun Also Rises is Ernest Hemingway's masterpiece about the lost generation of Americans living in Paris after WWI. What a lot of drinking they did! I can't believe all they consumed. They also poisoned their bodies with nicotine. They stayed up late carousing in bars and nightclubs and gambled. What a waste of talent! It's true that the hero of the story fought in WWI and had his balls blown off. That would pretty much make anyone depressed and inclined to drink. He's also in love with a hot English lady who loves him, but doesn't want to settle down with an impotent man. She apparently can settle for only one kind of sexual satisfaction. What a shame! She keeps messing up her relationships with other men and falls back to the hero for support. No wonder he has problems! At any rate, after drinking and carousing in Paris, the group of friends, consisting of several men and the English lady who is engaged to one of them, goes to Spain for fishing and bullfighting in Pamplona. Hemingway's descriptions of the scenery and people are all first-rate. I could easily imagine being with them. I even had the urge to pour myself a glass of red wine or brandy while I was reading about their actions. I didn't understand the significance of the fishing trip that Hemingway describes before the bull fighting. The descriptions were fabulous, but I don't really see how that carried the plot forward. I suppose I could read some literary criticism to find out. But I'm 60 and if something doesn't hit me over the head the first time around, then I figure I don't need to figure it out. The bullfighting scenes, on the other hand, were clear in their meaning. Hemingway's hero has what the locals call "aficionado", passion for the bull fights. The hero is given special treatment by the innkeeper, who knows that he understands bulls and bull fights. The bulls are unloaded from cages one at a time and there were steers in the corrals to receive them and keep them from fighting. Some of the steers were killed by the bulls, but usually their presence calmed the bulls down. Our hero is a steer, I suppose in his crowd of bulls who were all competing for the same English lady. The English lady ends up falling for the young matador, runs away from her current fiance with him, then later leaves him. As usual, she calls on our hero to help her pick up the pieces.

Pros: beautifully written descriptions of life in Paris in the 1920's, plus bullfighting. Good character development plus spiritual dissolution. A reasonably quick read that can go with Mumms or Chateau Margaux.

Cons: the characters drink too much. Hemingway presents drinking as a matter of fact way of life. I suppose it was true then, but I still don't like it. There is anti-Semitism. One of the main characters is Jewish. He is portrayed as a jerk. The sentiment among the characters seems to be that because he is Jewish he is a jerk. Nowadays, I think an author with any sense would slant his character to be a jerk who just happens to be Jewish. The bull fighting scenes are brutal. I know that bull fighting is a cultural, spiritual thing, and when the bull is killed the man and beast become one, but isn't that what some serial killers also think--they are never closer to someone else as when they are killing them? I get the connection between sexuality, masculinity, and bullfighting. I just don't enjoy thinking about it or visualizing the death of magnificent animals.

I suppose I give Hemingway a thumbs up for this one. Could all those English teachers be wrong? I just don't think it's the best thing I ever read.