Who is Lady Brett Ashley? The infamous “bitch-goddess” (Fulton) of many names often cast aside with misnomers of Circe, man eater, and nymphomaniac despised by men for her apparent promiscuity and destruction of the male ego in The Sun Also Rises. The appropriate interpretation of, quite possibly, the true code hero of the novel, the “alcoholic aristocrat” (Bloom 1) and simultaneous goddess Circe, who “turns men into swine” (148) is hindered most effectively by Jake Barnes’ narration. She is disregarded as, how Robert W Lewis bluntly puts it, as a “destructive muse” or “a circle turning her lovers into swine”, Jackson J. Benson claims she is “dominated by mere self pity.” Lady Brett Ashley is recognized as the most controversial of Hemingway’s bitches, and is famously analyzed in the book Ernest Hemingway and the
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Despite the various interpretations contrary to what Brett represents, Willimgham argues that Brett serves as the most vividly living character of the novel. It is Jake Barnes who is, unfortunately, the main source of information on Brett. So, the trouble of understanding Lady Brett Ashley begins with the way Jake’s narration influences the way she is perceived. Jake insists in the opening of the novel that his narration is intended to be “cool and detached,” because in the past he had made the “unfortunate mistake, for a writer, of first having been Mr. Jake Barnes,” (4) instead of being an impartial party. In his attempt to remain coolly detached and unbiased in his storytelling, he fails, his judgement towards Lady Brett shining through. His trying to remain unbiased resulted information that would not only enhance the story, but provide further information on the mysterious Brett being left
Despite the various interpretations contrary to what Brett represents, Willimgham argues that Brett serves as the most vividly living character of the novel. It is Jake Barnes who is, unfortunately, the main source of information on Brett. So, the trouble of understanding Lady Brett Ashley begins with the way Jake’s narration influences the way she is perceived. Jake insists in the opening of the novel that his narration is intended to be “cool and detached,” because in the past he had made the “unfortunate mistake, for a writer, of first having been Mr. Jake Barnes,” (4) instead of being an impartial party. In his attempt to remain coolly detached and unbiased in his storytelling, he fails, his judgement towards Lady Brett shining through. His trying to remain unbiased resulted information that would not only enhance the story, but provide further information on the mysterious Brett being left