The Reason behind It All (Motivation)

“‘Ashley, chap she got the title from, was a sailor, you know. Ninth baronet. When he came home he wouldn’t sleep in a bed. Always made Brett sleep on the floor. Finally, when he got really bad, he used to tell her he’d kill her. Always slept with a loaded service revolver. Brett used to take the shells out when he’d gone to sleep. She hasn’t had an absolutely happy life, Brett. Damned shame, too. She enjoys things so.’”

-The Sun Also Rises, p 207

In this passage, we finally learn Brett’s motivation. Before this paragraph, we had to just assume that Brett’s flirting and romantic escapades were simply a result of her flapper personality. Without a background story, we had to guess that Brett acted the way she did because of a 1920s culture that included new freedom for women. Upon reading this passage, though, we can see that this is not the case. Before her engagement to Mike, Brett was involved in an abusive marriage. Perhaps the abuse was not physical, but being told by one’s spouse that he is going to kill you definitely constitutes as abuse. I think Brett’s previous marriage has caused her to become emotionally and romantically unstable. Similarly to Cohn, she falls in love with any man who treats her with respect because she was not given any respect in her previous marriage.

Hemingway finally includes this explanation of Brett’s motivation not only as a commentary on abusive relationships, but also as a twist in our perception of Brett and—because we can now better see the similarity between her and Cohn—of Robert Cohn as well.