Who Is Brett Ashley

“Freedom is not the absence of commitments, but the ability to choose and commit myself to what is best for me.”- Pablo Coelho. In the novel, The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway, the character Lady Brett Ashley struggles with commitment in relationships. In the novel, Brett Ashley is characterized as a troubled socialite as she does not seem to draw much happiness from her independence as she battles between commitment and being alone. Many women crave the attention that comes with relationships, although these characters also frighten some people. Brett is a strong willed and a very independent woman, whose beauty seems to charm many people, although she refuses to carry out with any man and prefers ultimate self reliance. This can be
Brett seems to tell Jake a lot about herself, for example she talks about how miserable her life is, “Brett was leaning back in the corner, her eyes closed. I sat beside her. The cab started with a Jerk. “Oh, darling, I’ve been so miserable.” Brett said” (32) The author illuminates her trust in Jake as she openly tells him how distressed she has become. However, Brett still seems to push away from jake, just as she does with everyone else. Her neglect towards any man who becomes infatuated with her leads her her life, like the lives of many in her generation, is aimless and unfulfilling, “Couldn't we live together, Brett? couldn't we just live together?” “I don’t think so. I’d just trumper you with everybody.” Hemingway portrays Brett's unwillingness to cooperate in her transcendent relationship with Jake,although he does not necessarily see it as just that. Nonetheless Brett seems to drag him along with her erratic intimate life. She continues to pull his strings and love him in a way where she can continue to be in her safe zone, thus forcing Jake into a bewildering state of mind, “Oh, Jake,” brett said. “We could have had such a damned good time together.”...The car slowed suddenly pressing Brett against me. “Yes”I said.“Isn’t it pretty to think so?” Hemingway gives Jake an arrogant tone in the last line,
She even wears her hair cut short, like a man. She's one of the boys, whether the boys are the group of gay men in whose company Brett is first seen, or Jake, Cohn, Mike, Romero, and the Count, all of whom she has attempted affairs with. Yet she strikes all those who meet her, even Bill Gorton, as attractively feminine. Brett does not seem to have any female friends, she is a "man's woman." As a result, nearly all the men in the book fall in love with her, not just Jake and Cohn, but Mike, Romero, the Count, and even the drummer in the Paris nightclub and the Basque peasants who see her on the streets of Pamplona. Jake and Mike love Brett so passionately, that they allow (and in Jake's case, encourage) her to pursue her sexual affairs with other men. Brett seems to feel dirty, as shown by the number of baths she takes throughout the novel, she may be attracted to Jake partly because he is "clean" (asexual). Romero may be "clean" in another way (a virgin). Although she continues with her many affairs, she also has potent feelings for Jake, "It’s funny," I said. "It’s very funny. And it’s a lot of fun, too, to be in love." "Do you think so?" her eyes looked flat again. "I don’t mean fun that way. In a way it’s an enjoyable feeling." "No," she said. "I think it’s hell on earth." (44) Brett can’t handle her feelings for Jake, she wants him but can’t have him, which creates the feeling of