Oppression In Giovanni's Room

One final binary opposition in Giovanni’s Room that deals with the idea of perception and self-perception is that of the clichéd tropes of the innocent American and the experienced/corrupting European. The conception of innocence and experience is brought up by who Jacques mentions the Garden of Eden and the ideal innocence it represents and David muses “everyone, after all, goes the same dark road – and the road has a trick of being most dark, most treacherous, when it seems most bright – and it’s true that nobody stays in the garden of Eden” (Baldwin 27-28). Here the light stands for the perception of innocence associated with whiteness and the “normal” for the American and the eventuality of the reality of darkness and non-normative puritanical

While the text is objectively a hyper-masculine story with content ranging from alcohol, bullfighting, and sex, underneath this manly exterior are unclear and subverted gender identities and Hemingway’s “famous obsession of manhood” is questioned. (Onderdonk 71). As an author, Hemingway is thought of as “the quintessential macho writer” and The Sun Also Rises plays with the idea of what a man should be like, begging the question “ How does one tell the real man from the counterfeit?” (Strychacz 246) (Onderdonk 73). Through his protagonist, Jake, Hemingway advocates for a different kind of masculinity, one associated with silence and stoicism rather than noise and performance. Hemingway’s hero is a literal embodiment of his iceberg principle, practicing stoicism and making for a lack of spoken language with action. Attention is drawn in the text to moments that seem to receive little attention, mainly Jake’s war wound. As a critical part of the text and an important symbol in his relationship with Brett, Jake’s impotence following an injury in the war is a silent space in the story. The silence around the wound acts to draw attention and curiosity from readers, and as part of the 7/8 below the surface, it becomes a critical motif in the work. In contrast, what is loud and obnoxious in the text, the figure of Robert Cohn who desperately wants everyone to know about his

Despite the book opening with his status as a champion boxer, this appearance of masculinity is brought down and Cohn is likened to a bull in a bullfight, which despite outwardly appearing tough and masculine is ultimately defeated. The comparison between Cohn and a bull is made when Jake explains to Brett that a bull has “a left and a right like a boxer”, likening the bull to Cohn as the former middleweight boxing champion of Princeton (Hemingway 144). Like the bull whose death is not victimized and instead celebrated, the ultimate destruction of Cohn with him leaving Pamplona as a crying mass is denied as a moment of pity to the readers (Hart 559). Cohn is a romantic; he has not been disillusioned by the war like other characters who all were actively involved in the war. He believes in traditional romantic fairytale where as the noble man he can rescue the fallen woman Brett and that his love will “conquer all” (Hemingway 204). However with the androgynous, sexually liberated figure of Brett this is not an option and his attempts represent an old-fashioned kind of masculinity that is not longer relevant after the war. The Sun Also Rises deals with changing gender relations and perceptions of masculinity following the war and the matador, a figure of androgyny, is a figure