History of the Critical Reception of the Sun Also Rises

¶ … Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway. Specifically, it will offer a history of the critical reception of "The Sun Also Rises." This will show how the text was interpreted since the time of its publication, highlighting those critics who made a major contribution to new ways of interpreting it. Critics have looked at this book for decades, and many have come up with some interesting interpretations that challenge the reader to think more deeply about what they read.

THE SUN ALSO RISES

Ernest Hemingway's "The Sun Also Rises" is an enduring classic, which has raised numerous criticisms since its release in 1926. From the day it was released to present times, critics continue to read and review the book, and so, the book is continually being reevaluated, with new interpretations corresponding to changes in society and culture. One critic noted its immediate success and influence on the reading public.

It was an immediate but not a sensational success, with 26,000 copies sold in the first year. Then, gradually, people began to notice what a widespread effect it was having on the new generation, the one that came of age after World War I. Hemingway, as Lord Byron had done a century before, gave the young people attitudes to strike and patterns of conduct to follow. They not only wrote like him, if they wrote, and walked with his rolling slouch if they had seen him, but also drank like his heroes and heroines, cultivated a hard-boiled melancholy and talked in page after page of Hemingway dialogue (Cowley 50).

They were the "lost generation," and dozens of critics have noted how they not only identified with Hemingway's works, the emulated them, and took them directly to their hearts and minds, and "The Sun Also Rises" was their anthem. Critics have usually heralded the book for its form, its characterization, and its dialogue. However, there have been other reviews of the novel that dug deeper, looking into religious issues, the masculinity of the characters, and how the novel portrayed the survivors of the First World War.

Another critic believes the novel is quite anti-Semitic, and notes, "When he [Hemingway] writes about the values of Catholicism in "The Sun Also Rises" there is a strong implication that Protestantism fails to understand the issues" (Berman 33). He goes on to note that the time-period when the book was written was notoriously anti-Semitic, and Hemingway's adherence to this social thought of the time is evident throughout the novel. "That is a large issue in the text of 'The Sun Also Rises.' In this novel Catholic intellectual authority is levelled against Jewish skeptical presumption in the guise of progressive Protestant style" (Berman 33). Berman also cites several other earlier critics who also subscribe to the anti-Semitism theme in the book.

With respect to Cohn, Michael Reynolds identifies certain "signals" obvious to "the American reader in 1926" about his group identity: because Cohn comes from a rich and old New York family he belongs also "to the Jewish establishment, which many thought to be a threat to the American way of life" ("SAR In Its Time" 53). And, his individual "dislikable characteristics" are "never" separated from his "Jewishness." In fact, when Reynolds examines the historical context, he concludes flatly that its anti-Semitism is directed not at Cohn as an individual but at "a rich New York Jew who did not know his place" (54) (Berman 33).

Critics do not have an answer to why Hemingway wrote so critically of Jews, but they do agree that character Cohn represents all Jews, and thus, Hemingway's writing represents feeling about the entire race, and did so at a time when many Americans totally agreed. "But the text, in its uncompromising use of the plural, is not conjectural: Cohn stands for all Jews"

Berman 33). Another critic notes how this reflects on the character, who always uses his muscles instead of his mind to solve his problems. "Robert Cohn of 'The Sun Also Rises' who answers all criticism with an uppercut is another typical Hemingway protagonist, and in Cohn this virility is not a rational value but rather the expression of an emotional weakness" (Geismar 167). Clearly, the Jewish character is the weakest emotionally, and this is another shot at anti-Semitism according to many critics and reviewers.

Many of Hemingway's characters exude masculinity and raw power, and this novel is no exception, as many critics have also noted. These are men who are strong, silent, and often deadly. They are not afraid of death, as their running with the bulls shows. One 1943 review said, "They act like people who have not fully grown up and who lack the self-awareness to realize this; in fact, they possess no desire to grow up" (Farrell 222). This is also quite in keeping with their masculinity, which does not necessarily denote maturity, as their running with the bulls in Pamplona also shows. Grown, mature men do not need to prove their masculinity by running from bulls, but young men still finding themselves certainly do, and critics recognized this.

Historically, critics have often looked at Hemingway's commentary on war and disillusionment in the novel, as this writer did in 1943.

Whenever there is a widespread mood of disillusionment caused by an event as catastrophic as a world war, that mood is bound to be nihilistic and rather adolescent in character unless it serves as the basis for a radical and progressive political orientation that aims to change and better the world. This is illustrated in "The Sun Also Rises"