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The Sun Also Rises (Cliffs Notes)

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Gertrude Stein named the generation that came of age during the First World War the "lost generation." The world quickly adopted the phrase as the most accurate description for the generation who died, fought, or worked during the war as they passed through the threshold of their adult lives. Before the novel opens, Hemingway quotes Stein as well as a biblical passage that contrasts the transient nature of human generations against the eternal survival of nature. The world remains and the sun continues to rise and set despite the inevitable passage of each human generation into death. The juxtaposition of the two epigraphs produces an ambivalent tone. There is hope because there will be a new generation beyond the aimless generation that populates The Sun Also Rises. There is also a bitter irony in the contrast. Every generation is lost in one sense because they will all eventually pass away. Some are perhaps more lost than others. The characters of the The Sun Also Rises are clearly emblematic of a generation of lost souls. Just as they approached the sunrise of their adult lives, a horrific war of unprecedented death and destruction shattered their world. The pre-war values of love, faith, manhood, and womanhood that previously gave meaning to their reality proved to be an inadequate answer to the unbelievable scale of violence of the war. The characters in The Sun Also Rises are a careless, aimless, pleasure-seeking crowd. They wander through an endless, drunken procession of parties, cafes, and sexual affairs in a desperate search for meaning in their lives. It is no coincidence that many of them are artists and writers. Through the work of artistic expression, they try to produce meaning in a world seemingly lost to rampant, amoral consumerism and lovelessness. They are always going somewhere, but never really arriving anywhere. The narrator, Jake Barnes, provides us with an incomplete portrait of the aimless expatriate crowd living in 1920's Europe. We must always search for what he does not say. Half of the story lies between the lines in the novel; perhaps this symbolizes the absence of meaning in the characters' lives. Although not a single shot is fired throughout the novel, The Sun Also Rises is about The Great War. We know a few scarce specific details of the characters' war experience. However, the war relentlessly haunts the characters throughout the novel. The effects of the war are evident in their alcoholism and their casual cruelty to one another. It is evident in the way they skirt the edges of their war experiences in their conversation. It is the war and its effects they are fleeing when they descend into the forgetfulness of alcohol. They flee it continually by refusing to discuss its horrors directly. They flee it by running from one cafe, one country, and one party to the next. They are prisoners of their own attempts to escape the war that maimed them physically and psychologically. They are attempting to flee their shattered selves, but as Jake Barnes says, "You can't get away from yourself by moving from one place to another." Confrontation is the central conflict that divides every character's consciousness. For many, this is the hardest battle of the war.

I loved the book it is great for all kids to understand! It is awesome! It really teaches kids responsibility with a humor added to jazz it up, kinda like a true life story is being told!