“The Sun Also Rises” by Ernest Hemingway – The Death of All Illusions

Very few of us have managed to grow up without hearing the name Ernest Hemingway being thrown around, especially in high school. Regardless of whether you have come to love or hate him, you cannot deny the impact he had on American literature, nor can you deny that some of his books can be objectively described as timeless classics and masterpieces. The Sun Also Rises is definitely one of them, and first published in 1926, it not only pushed literature forward, but it also had an impact on people as a whole.

To give you a brief idea of what it’s about, The Sun Also Rises follows Jake Barnes and Lady Brett Ashley, a rather unusual couple that undertakes an odyssey of self-discovery around Europe, right after the end of the First World War. 

However, the book is much more than the adventures of its main characters (though they are definitely entertaining as well), basically being a social commentary on the way things were after the First World War, the one many dubbed as being “The war to end all wars”. It was a very strange, difficult and confusing time for humanity, one during which people started to expand their consciousness, exploring what the world really had to offer, and most importantly, try and break the traditions of the past.

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway (Book cover)
Though I have obviously never lived during that time, I have to say that if things are as Hemingway describes them, it must have been a heck of a time period to live through. His style perfectly captures the atmosphere of angst and disillusionment mixed with a certain degree of nihilism and a grand hope for the future experienced by the main characters. 

The book is filled with immorality, decadence, and a basic disregard for tradition. Though today it may appear to be a bit tame, at the time it went against the grain, being a reflection on how the real world can be: cold, brutal, unforgiving, and generally messed up. 

Those of you who like to read books for the messages they transmit, the atmosphere they create and the way the characters develop will definitely enjoy The Sun Also Rises, one of Hemingway’s greatest and perhaps even more controversial masterpieces.

Ernest Hemingway <br />(July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961)

Ernest Hemingway
(July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961)


Personal site

Ernest Hemingway was a famous American author as well as journalist who prided himself in having a simple style of writing, being capable of using the simplest propositions to convey the greatest of ideas. Some of his better-known works include The Old Man and the Sea and For Whom the Bell Tolls.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular Posts

“The Locked Door” by Freida McFadden – Roots of a Lost Innocence

Image
  Freida McFadden has been quietly writing some exciting and original thrillers in her spare time from being a practicing physician, and The Locked Door is one of her latest offering in the genre.  It tells the story of Nora, a surgeon and daughter of a serial killer now in jail, who sees her life assaulted from the dark as someone begins to recreate her father's work with the exact same signature.
Read more

“The Lost Colony” by A.G. Riddle – A New Home Among the Stars

Image
A.G. Riddle's Long Winter Trilogy Series is one many of us will remember for the amazing story it brings of humanity's last stand against an overwhelming enemy in times of hopelessness. In The Lost Colony , the third book in the series, we follow James and Emma on their own respective struggles as humanity tries to settle itself on a new planet with an unseen danger none could have foreseen.
Read more

“Winter World” by A.G. Riddle – Ice Age from the Void

Image
A.G. Riddle is a true literary explorer seeking to push humanity to its limits and beyond, setting them on a desperate collision course with something beyond its understanding in Winter World . With a sudden ice age dawning on humanity entire swathes of land become uninhabitable and people begin dropping like flies, with anarchy reigning supreme. Looking to the stars for a miraculous solution, the remnants of humanity find a massive mysterious object floating near Mars ...whatever it is, our civilization's hopes of survival rest entirely in its hands.
Read more

“The Girl on the Stairs” by Barry Ernest – The Small Thorn you Can’t Ignore

Image
Girl on the Stairs , by Barry Ernest and with a foreword written by David Lifton, is an exploration of one specific aspect of the JFK assassination. More precisely, it looks into what a little girl by the name of Victoria Adams saw on that day while standing in the staircase of the Texas School Book Depository, where Lee Harvey Oswald was supposedly making his escape.  Actually, it is more about what she didn’t see than what she did see. Victoria was on the staircase Oswald supposedly used, at the exact same time he supposedly used it. If he were to be there, even the little girl she was, Victoria would have noticed a nervous man quickly running down the stairs. However, she says that on that day, she was alone there, with nobody to be found, especially Oswald.
Read more

“Three Comrades” by Erich Maria Remarque – The Other Side of the Barricade

Image
The two World Wars have been documented, discussed and depicted from virtually every perspective imaginable, ranging from small children caught in a crossfire all the way the leaders of each country. However, it seems that here is a startlingly small amount of attention dedicated to the small hiatus period between the two wars, a time during which many changes came to pass in Germany in a very short amount of time.
Read more