He's "lost touch with the soil". He doesn't have a country, a partner who loves him and actually is willing to be with him, or a reason for doing any of the things he does. He is young enough to still want to go through the motions of taking part in the spectacle of young people entertaining themselves (the bullfights for instance), but he's happiest probably when he is on the fishing trip.

Despair, unrequited love, ennui, meaninglessness--it's ok if you don't connect with these themes, but are you surprised that a lot of other people do?

I think it's also important to keep in mind that in early 20th century Europe, it was safer in a lot of places to drink wine than to drink water (alcohol kills microorganisms that can cause illness). The cycle or drinking and feeling bad is something a lot of people relate to as well.

>I’d like to hear other peoples’ perspective on the book, because to me it is just a book about nothing.

It's been over twenty years since I've read the book, but the sun also rises, if I remember, is an allusion to the fact that he can't get it up. If you feel that the story is meaningless, it might be because he is sexually ineffectual. He is impotent.

Remember, this is a book about the post-World War 1 generation. The whole point is that they have lost their faith in everything and are just racing through life pointlessly.

It requires a bit of context that many people don't have anymore. World War 1 wasn't just hideously destructive, it irrevocably changed our culture. Before WWI, people still had what we consider to be old fashioned notions of honour, chivalry, very traditional gender roles and so on.

Entire villages and neighbourhoods send all their men into WW1 with thoughts of chivalry in combat. And WW1 ground them up like a meat grinder and spat the maimed remnants of the survivors back out.

WW1 was a war fought by people with old fashioned notions but industrialised weaponry. It is hard to understate how horrific it was. Not just for the combatants but also for the survivors and the people back home.

It resulted in what they called the lost generation. A generation of people who felt absolutely no connection with the culture from before the war. Heroism, honour, chivalry, propriety, how meaningless it all seemed after the horror of WW1 put the lie to it all.

The lost generation, in the eyes of their elders, was a generation without any aim in life. A generation that just drank and partied and fucked and generally wandered their way through life without any of the traditional goals like maintaining ones reputation, finding a spouse and starting a family and career.

The protagonists in this novel are part of the last generation. And what Heinlein is doing is nuancing that opinion of the lost generation as a bunch of godless wastrels.

He's depicting them as people who had the illusion ripped away from the world was WW1 exposed the lie behind their society. It doesn't make them wastrels. It made them people on a quest to give new meaning to their lives.

So yeah, they travel, party, drink and fuck around. Their whole world was destroyed and now they have to figure out for themselves what their new values and goals are. And yes, that can make them look aimless and pointless as they indulge themselves to figure out what they want for themselves and from each other.

For me, that context makes the book feel oddly contemporary because it's a state a lot of young adults find them in today as well. A world that changes so rapidly, with many people being migrants who don't entirely share their parents culture. We're all just drifting, trying to figure out what we want our lives to be.

I read this book long ago in high school but from what I remember it is about society just after WWI. Everything was destroyed after the Great War- the social order, religious belief took a big hit, the economies of many countries, literally whole countries lay in ruins. The fabric that held everything together was gone. Young people didn't trust the people that led them into a war that killed many of them and destroyed the world and many of their prospects. There was nothing to cohere society but making money. This is what is being portrayed in The Sun Also Rises. Nick's physical impotence mirrors his emotional impotence and hope for his or future generations. They move from sensation to sensation with nothing to hold onto but the desire not to feel the emptiness that the world has no meaning except what you choose to give it. This is an existential novel. These young people have nothing to live for but hedonism and materialism in a world that destroyed itself. We are still reeling from the effects of WWI to this day.

I feel this post lol. I read The Sun Also Rises on a whim about two months ago, my first Hemingway read. I read a lot of novels and don't consider myself a slouch by any means. I expected a lot more from this book, to be honest. Some others have offered a pretty keen insight into Jake's character and what he is 'supposed to represent', insights that didn't form for me when I read the book or upon reflection. I too came away with 'wow, must have been nice to be a rich person in the early 20th...'. My own jealousy of these fictional characters, or of Hemingway himself, of course getting in the way of actually getting something out of the book.
I never saw Jake as a 'real person' in the book. Of course I felt for his character in times where he seemed to be stuck on the fringe of something that had meaning, but the insights about him (Jake or Hemingway?) not being able to get it up kind of ruin the beauty of the story for me. I saw Jake as more of a contemplative artsy type who didn't poke whatever he could, even if he wanted to (especially when he wanted to) as it seemed to be the norm among his friends. Like Brett never took his feelings seriously and he knew that so they just played at loving each other from afar, not that he didn't have it in him to actually do the deed.

I enjoyed this book but I don't think it's commonly regarded as his best. Farewell to Arms and For Whom the Bell Tolls consistently gain more acclaim.

Jake is impotent. And you missed the point. Also it’s not as great as people say. Hemingway invented a style of writing that changed things forever. Beyond that I don’t know what to tell you.

I read it when I was 25 and was so disappointed, I was actually angry. I was surprised I finished it. But I'm glad I did.

I'm now in my 30s and find myself thinking about that book on a weekly basis. Only read it once and years later...I like it. It has layers of thought experiment provoking themes that can keep your mind busy. What was it really like to be an angry WW1 veteran victimized by obscurity? And the rollercoaster between hopeless an ecstasy that youth brings. I find it more relatable with the passage of time.

It was the slowest burn of all books I've read, but very much helped me to partly understand Hemingway's genius. His writing can stop you in your tracks six years after you read it.

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My perspective is a farewell to arms is also worth reading, as good as for whom the bell toles.

As far as Sun also Rises, I think most of that book is about Jakes dick not working, and how much that sucks, or something.

When I read it, I felt like I was stuck watching unlikable people doing nothing that interested me. But I like Hemingway in general.

When does art have no meaning?

Jake can’t truly be with the woman he loves (Brett) because of his impotence as a result of an injury during WWI. Brett may love Jake, but she knows she couldn’t be faithful to him because he couldn’t satisfy her sexually. Both of their lives were destroyed by the war in different ways. Jake’s friends have also been damaged by the war, in different ways.

There are activities they can still enjoy, but never again in the same way. Their innocence is gone.

The bulls and bullfighters are important to the story, too. But I’ve only read the book once (although recently) and don’t feel like I got everything from it that was there.