The Sun Also Rises

Author: Ernest Hemingway
Year: 1926

Hemingway's first novel used to be my one of my all-time favorite reads. There was something about the directionless plot, exotic locales, and matter-of-fact dialogue that struck me as wholly fresh and liberating. Coming back to the novel several years later, I can still appreciate those elements, but I've come to realize the truth of the cliche that "Hemingway's true genius is in his short stories." Though characters like war-scarred Jake Barnes and tragically romantic Robert Cohn are interesting, their private dramas begin to burn out after even a slender 250 page novel.

Perhaps most frustrating about the novel is Hemingway's choice of subject matter. The group of men and women he depicts are mostly wealthy expatriates whose ennui and irreverence are hard to relate with. The most earnest and sympathetic character is Barnes, though even his struggles occasionally lapse into the realm of self-pitying despair. The best line in the whole novel is delivered by him during an all-night session of insomniac pondering: "I did not care what it is all about. All I wanted to know was how to live in it." And for the most part, the novel reflects this philosophy, showing Barnes' attempts to appreciate the beauty of his surroundings despite the shenanigans of his peers and the agony of his handicap.

The Sun Also Rises still holds up as a classic, perhaps a work of a young author meant to be enjoyed by men and women still in their youth. Though seeming to profess a viewpoint of disillusionment, Hemingway's novel revels in its illusions of European decadence and wild lives free from the concerns of consequence.

Value: Silver