hemingway in paris and spain

Limited engagement—internationally-acclaimed Elevator Repair Service had audiences
lining out the door for The Sound and the Fury and for Gatz, which The New York Times
declared “The most remarkable achievement in theater not only of this year but also of
this decade.” Now, ERS completes its trilogy of classic American work s with The Select
(The Sun Also Rises), an inspired staging of Ernest Hemingway’s masterpiece novel.
With cutting wit, doomed romance, and a live bullfight that has to be seen to be believed,
this is an exquisite, wine-soaked homage to one of the finest novels ever written. The
Select promises a smart and compelling conclusion to ERS’ exploration of some of the
greatest American literature.
"A profoundly intelligent pieceof theatre"—The Scotsman
INTERVIEW WITH
JOHN COLLINS
John Collins is the founding artistic director
of Elevator Repair Service, and has directed
all of their productions since 1991.
McCarter’s Artistic Engagement Manager,
Erica Nagel, conducted this interview with
him during rehearsals for The Select (The
Sun Also Rises).
Erica Nagel: Why did Elevator Repair Service decide to adapt The Sun Also
Rises?
John Collins: This is the third adaptation of a major novel that our ensemble has
done, and each presented its own unique set of problems. For Gatz, we did the
whole book–that was the challenge we wanted to give ourselves. With The Sound
and the Fury, the challenges had a lot more to do with Faulkner’s cryptic
structure, and figuring out a way to get that on stage. So, when we went looking
for a third novel to do, we looked for one that would give us a third set of
challenges but that also still had a relationship with those two. And we thought,
“Well, if you draw a line through Fitzgerald and Faulkner, where does it point?”
And in a kind of half-joking, high school English class sort of way, we said “You
know, it’s obvious, it has to be Hemingway.” So we started reading Hemingway
out loud and with The Sun Also Rises, the dialogue seemed to just perfectly drop
into place on our actors. It was as if I had already cast that play befor e I even
knew it because the people in the company took so well to the characters. So at
that point it was just a kind of intuitive choice because of how right it felt.
And the fact that we were so drawn to the dialogue in this book also suggested to
me how the approach would be different. In the rest of the trilogy, we had been
very religious about sticking to the author’s words but we decided that we would
try for the first time to actually edit the novel. There were a few practical reasons
we had to do that with this novel–partly just because it was a lot longer. It
wouldn’t work the same way Gatz did. You couldn’t just read the whole thing out
loud and find some kind of theatrical rhythm in that. There is a theatrical rhythm
in it, but it’s embedded inside, and we had to dig it out. So we were kind of
excavating a play from inside this novel. And that turned out to be a really
exciting new twist on the process for us. We made sure that we only used
Hemingway’s words; we didn’t write anything new. We just went in piecing
together parts of the novel into a play, so what we created was in some ways,
more of a straightforward script, using only the dialogue and select parts of the
narration from The Sun Also Rises.
EN: When you talk about excavating the play out of the novel, I’m curious
whether there’s something that you’re cutting towards? What do you think is
the central spine or the heart of the novel that you are bringing out in your
adaptation?
JC: You know, I try to be careful talking about that. I tal k a lot about what we
were most drawn to, what we felt intuitively would translate to the stage. Because
I don’t want to claim that we have delivered, you know, the definitive stage
version of this novel. No matter what you do or how genius a writer or ada pter
you are, you’re going to be giving a version that is specific to you. We’re making
a play out of what we responded to in this novel. And really that’s the dialogue.
I guess what you don’t get from our play is Hemingway’s sort of obsessive
literary quality. You know, the immense long descriptions of things. And there’s
a lot more of a sense of internal thoughts in the novel than you get from our play,
because the novel is told from Jake Barnes’ perspective. You do get some of that
and I think some of that serves the play really well, but it’s not...it’s different
than say, Gatz, where the experience of the play is very closely related to the
experience of reading the book. This is different from reading the book. And I
think it differs in a good way because–not to criticize the book–but I think we
sharpened the action of the novel by leapfrogging over some of the digressions in
the narration. And those digressions are quintessential Hemingway; I mean that’s
who he was, that’s how he wrote. But I think in The Sun Also Rises, he also
created a really dynamic, sophisticated, witty, engaging narrative among this
group of people and extracting that from a novel that has a plethora of other
things in it as well. Of course, it has not been easy, but it’s been o ne of the most
exciting things we’ve ever done.
EN: Can you talk a little bit about the title?
JC: I like our pieces to have their own titles even if they are very much based on
another work. So, we were kicking around ideas and just kind of looking at w hat
we had made. And what we had made (or were making) was all set in a café
basically; that was the setting that we chose. One of the main café settings of the
novel is The Café Select in Paris. So it seemed like a good choice for what to
name the play. That is something I really like to do: I like to create a set that
creates all sorts of interesting limitations that we have to deal with. That what’s I
love about theatre–the way it forces you to make creative decisions in a very
physically limiting situation. No matter how much money you throw at
something, it’s still happening in one room. So I like to exaggerate that in our
productions, and in this one, our set was for much of the play the Café Select.
Regarding the title, I also liked that there is a t ype of double meaning there, as a
way of referring to our process this time around, which was that we were cutting
and selecting different parts of the novel to make our show.
EN: I reread the novel recently, and the anti-Semitic language really jumped
out at me. When I saw The Select in an earlier version, I don’t remember
being jolted out of the story in that way, and now I can’t remember if it
wasn’t in the adaptation or if the language was just finessed in a way that
didn’t jar me as it did on the page.
JC: Yeah, that’s a very difficult aspect of this novel, for sure. One of the reasons
that I love American literature of the 20s is because the language of these authors
translates very naturally to contemporary English. It doesn’t sound like it’s from
another time. But the fact that it feels so familiar and so contemporary, can make
the anti-Semitism and some other attitudes that were prevalent in the 20s in the
United States feel that much more shocking. So it was a tough thing to work with.
Now, I think what softens it or saves it in some way–and I don’t mean to say that
it forgives it–but, what prevents it from really undermining the whole piece, and
the book too for that matter, is that Hemingway really does humanize [the
character] Robert Cohn. And the kind of cruelty that is spoken against him–that’s
where all the anti-Semitic stuff comes–I don’t think Hemingway constructed that
in such a way that you are meant to sympathize with the haters. It’s very clear
that what’s going on is cruelty. This is a novel about a lot of world-weary, in
some ways over-sophisticated and cynical people. At times, the only one who
seems to have any kind of real humanity is Robert Cohn. Jake has become
incredibly cynical because of his war injury and his failed relationship with Brett,
and Mike Campbell, at his anti-Semitic worst, is just a drunk. Brett, though we
eventually feel sympathy for her as well, is often cruel and manipulative. So the
novel is very harsh on a personal level, but there’s an awful lot in there that
actually makes you sympathize as much or more with Robert Cohn as any other
character. And in fact, when you look at some of the historical and biographical
details around Hemingway, you can see that Cohn is actually as much a stand in
for Hemingway as Jake Barnes is.
EN: That’s so interesting; I was wondering what kind of research you did
into Hemingway’s life and how that informed your process.
JC: Not a tremendous amount to be perfectly honest. But in terms of Hemingway
and Cohn, I mean, Hemingway was a boxer and one of the critical episodes in the
novel and the play, is when Cohn is so angry and upset about being jilted by Brett
that he goes out and gets in a fight and beats up a couple people. And then
afterwards he just collapses in his room and weeps. And this is an exact episode
from Hemingway’s life– he got in some brawl and slugged somebody and then,
you know, fell apart. And that scene in the play, and also in the novel, is where
you really see someone expressing emotion and pain in a way that’s un like any
other expression of it in the novel. So, in some ways Cohn is almost the
protagonist in a kind of tragedy. I mean, clearly this is a book in which Jake
Barnes is the protagonist, he’s the narrator, but I think when you look more
closely, when you look beyond the sort of horrible offensive statements that
people make, that even Jake as the narrator makes sometimes, you see something
much more complex and much more sympathetic.
EN: Do you have a favorite moment in the show and is it the same or
different than your favorite moment of the novel?
JC: Well, I have some favorite moments that overlap and some that don’t. One
that I like so much about both the show and the novel is the beginning of chapter
19 when Jake goes to San Sebastian. It’s some of the most beautifully simple
writing, and the descriptions of swimming in the ocean at San Sebastian are
somehow just so gorgeous. It’s a place where Hemingway’s descriptive writing is
at its best. I also love that part in the show because it’s this great so rt of coming
down from this big dramatic theatrical climax. And there’s so much that I love
about the show that’s very different than reading the novel. I like the dancing a
lot– that’s something that we bring to it very specifically; it’s very much ours.
I’m also pretty proud of the bullfighting sequence where we pull back the tables
and just grab whatever we can find in the room and have this full -on bullfight.
EN: The bullfight is so striking. Why do you think it’s such a pivotal piece of
the story?
JC: Well, you know, a bullfight is very Hemingway in a way. It’s something that
is gory and cruel and upsetting and it’s also this beautiful dance. It’s incredible
pageantry and design and performance coming together in something that’s
startling and shocking and cruel in a way. In that sense, it really does sum up the
whole novel. It’s a dramatic display that’s at once beautiful and horrible,
sophisticated and yet animal. It’s really what’s going on in the whole novel, on a
psychological level.
EN: Is there anything else you’d want the audience to know before they see
the show?
JC: One great experience that I’ve had performing this is that a lot of people
have come to me and said, “You know, I really thought I hated Hemingway, but I
loved this.” And so maybe I would say, to those people who think they know
Hemingway or who think they know what the experience of his novels is like, to
keep an open mind because they might be really surprised.
SUMMARY OF THE SUN ALSO RISES
Jake Barnes, a young WWI veteran and journalist
lives in Paris, where his days and nights are mostly
spent attending drunken social gatherings at various
bars and cafés. Among his cohort of likeminded
expats is Robert Cohn, a former Princeton boxer, who
is struggling in his unhappy relationship with his
fiancée Frances. One evening out on the town, Jake
runs into his friend, Lady Brett Ashley, a wild,
charming divorcée. Jake and Brett have been in love
A First Edition of The Sun Also
Rises, published in 1926.
for a long time, but because of a war wound that left
Jake unable to be sexually intimate, they have
decided they can’t be together.
As often happens when a man meets Brett, Robert
Cohn becomes infatuated with her. Although she doesn’t particularly care for
him, and despite the fact that she’s engaged to a wealthy Scotsman, she secretly
goes on holiday with Cohn to the Spanish resort town of San Sebastian.
When Jake’s friend Bill Gorton returns to Paris from New York, the group creates
a plan to go on another holiday, this time to Pamplona for the Fiesta, a multi -day
celebration punctuated by bullfights. When Brett and her fianc ée Mike don’t
show up on the first night of the holiday, Bill and Jake decide to pass the time
fishing in a Basque town in Northern Spain. Cohn, dismayed and distracted by the
fact that Brett is with Mike, stays in Pamplona to wait for her. After several d ays
of peaceful fishing, Jake and Bill head back to Pamplona, and enter the frenetic
fray of the Fiesta.
Jake is a true aficionado of bullfighting. He loves and
respects the sport, and is very impressed when he
meets a talented 19-year old bullfighter, Pedro
Romero. Brett is also impressed by Romero and asks
Jake to introduce them. Completely smitten, she
begins an affair with Romero. Jake, Mike, and Cohn
are all aware of the affair and are each crushed by it
in different ways. Cohn, in one particularly drunken
episode, beats Romero bloody in his hotel room.
Romero, despite his injuries, continues to dazzle the
crowds in his bullfights. At the end of the Fiesta,
Brett and Romero leave Pamplona together.
The Sun Also Rises was published
in the UK under the title Fiesta in
1927.
Jake leaves Pamplona for San Sebastian, the town
where Brett and Cohn previously conducted their brief affair, and attempts to
relax and let go of the drama of the past weeks. Not long after he arrives,
however, he receives a desperate telegram from Brett, pleading for him to come
to her in Madrid. He does, and finds her alone in a cheap hotel. She has sent
Romero away and decided to go back to Mike. Jake agrees to support her in her
choice, and while traveling away from the hotel in a taxi, they discuss the how
happy their lives might have been if they could have been together.
CAST AND CREATIVE
Frank Boyd
(Harvey Stone,
Julian Fleisher
(Braddocks, Count
Mike Iveson (Jake
Barnes) With ERS:
Kate Scelsa
(Frances, others)
With ERS:
Harris, others)
With ERS:
Arguendo,
Shuffle, GATZ.
Off-Broadway:
Architecting (The
Public Theater,
PS122),
Particularly in
the Heartland
(PS122, Bristol
Old Vic). The
Scarlet Letter
(Intiman
Theatre). Film &
TV: B.U.S.T,
Dogs ,Lie,
Yakima, Guiding
Light.
Mippipopolous,
Montoya, others) is a
singer, writer,
producer, and
composer who
performs widely with
his Rather Big Band.
He's collaborated with
Jennifer Holiday, Ana
Gasteyer, Molly
Ringwald, Kiki &
Herb, Nellie McKay,
and Martha Plimpton,
among others. OffBroadway credits
include February
House, Coraline, and
composing the
original music for
Almost, Maine. A
published author,
whose books include
The Drag Queens of
New York: An
Illustrated Field
Guide, (Riverhead),
he's writing the songs
for Measure of
Success, a new
musical. Yale
Graduate.
Shuffle, The Sound
and the Fury
(April Seventh,
1928), GATZ.
Selected stage
credits: Crime or
Emergency
(PS122, Soho
Rep), Dot
(Clubbed
Thumb/Ohio
Theatre), So Much
to Go Crazy (Off
Center, Austin,
TX). Tours with
Sarah Michelson,
NYC Players,
Nature Theater of
Oklahoma,
Dancenoise, and
many others.
Pete Simpson
(Mike Campbell,
others) With
Kaneza Schaal
(Georgette, The
Concierge, The
Susie Sokol
(Pedro Romero,
others) is a
Shuffle, The
Sound and the
Fury (April
Seventh, 1928),
GATZ. Other
credits: City
Council Meeting
(HERE and
A.R.T.),
collaborations
with puppet artist
Amanda
Villalobos: Light
Keepers (Dixon
Place) and Sister
Adorers in the
Cardboard
Convent (BAX).
Kate also writes
fiction for young
adults.
Lucy Taylor
(Brett Ashley)
ERS: GATZ
ERS: The Sound
and the Fury
(April Seventh,
1928) (European
tour).
Supernatural
Wife (Big Dance
Theater); People
without History,
Drummer Wanted
(Richard
Maxwell); North
Atlantic (Wooster
Group); Paradise
Hotel (Richard
Foreman); Lear,
The Appeal
(Young Jean
Lee’s Theatre
Company); Blue
Man Group,
Rainpan 43;
Aaron Landsman;
Matt Schneck;
Alix Pearlstein.
Film & TV:
Morning Glory,
Stefan, Law &
Order, Conan
O'Brien.
Training:
National Theater
Conservatory
(MFA).
Drummer, Belmonte,
others) With ERS:
The Sound and the
Fury (April Seventh,
1928).Off-Broadway:
Vieux Carre (Wooster
Group), Bellona,
Destroyer of Cities
(The Kitchen),
Cascando (Schapiro
Theatre). Regional:
Wild Honey, A Month
in the Country
(Porchlight Theater,
CA). Upcoming: Sea
Plays of Eugene
O’Neill (Wooster
Group, Richard
Maxwell). Film: The
End of All Resistance.
Awards: Princess
Grace George C.
Wolfe Award.
Training: Wesleyan
University (BA).
second-grade
teacher at St.
Ann’s School in
Brooklyn where
she has taught
since 1996. Susie
began performing
with ERS in 1992.
Since then, she has
appeared in all
ERS productions.
She has also
worked with
theater artists
Katherine Profeta,
Sibyl Kempson,
and Tina Satter.
(selected tours).
International: The
Underpants
(Company B
Belvoir, Sydney);
Life after George,
The Talented Mr
Ripley
(Melbourne
Theatre
Company); Pride
and Prejudice
(Melbourne
Theatre
Company,
Sydney Theatre
Company), Still
Angela, Journey
of the Plague
Year, The Ham
Funeral, Babes in
the Woods
(Malthouse
Theatre,Melbourn
e). Film:
Stepfather of the
Bride, My
Brother Jack,
Childstar.Trainin
g: Victorian
College of the
Arts (Australia).
Matt Tierney
(Robert
Cohn/Sound
Designer) WITH
ERS: Shuffle, The
Sound and The
Fury (April
Seventh, 1928)
Ben Williams (Bill
Gorton, Zizi,
others/Sound
Designer) has worked
for ERS as an actor,
sound designer,
technical director, and
production manager
Mark Barton
(Lighting Design)
With ERS: The
Sound and the
Fury (April
Seventh, 1928),
GATZ. OffBroadway:
John Collins
(Director)
founded Elevator
Repair Service in
1991. Since then,
he has directed or
co-directed all of
the company’s
(Lortel
Nomination),
GATZ. Recent
off-Broadway:
That Face; This
Orange, Hat and
Grace; and
Blasted (Hewes
Award).
Associate of
Young Jean Lee’s
Theater Company
(Lear, The
Shipment and
Church) and The
Wooster Group
(Hamlet, Lortel
Nomination).
Other recent:
Woolly
Mammoth,
A.R.T., Bard
College and
several
productions with
Ridge Theater
Company
including The
Death of
Klinghoffer
(BAM), Decasia
and Jennie Richee
(Obie Award).
2012 Lucille
Lortel and Obie
Awards for
Sound Design for
The Select.
since 2004. With
ERS: Shuffle,
Arguendo, The Sound
and the Fury (April
Seventh, 1928), No
Great Society, GATZ.
Recent credits: When
a Priest Marries a
Witch (Suzanne
Bocanegra),
Dreamless Land
(Julia Jarcho, NYC
Players), and So Much
To Go Crazy (Sibyl
Kempson). 2012
Lucille Lortel and
Obie Awards for
Sound Design for The
Select.
February House,
Titus Andronicus
(Public); Look
Back in Anger
(Roundabout);
Uncle Vanya,
Elective Affinities
(Soho Rep); The
Patsy/Jonas
(Transport Group);
Notes From
Underground,
Chair (TFANA);
The Big Meal,
Cicle Mirror
Transformation
(Playwrights
Horizons); The
Shipment, Church
(Young Jean Lee’s
Theater Company).
Additional
productions with
Target Margin,
Signature Theatre,
Salt Theater,
PS122, New
Georges, Clubbed
Thumb. Regional:
La Jolla, Yale Rep,
Long Wharf,
Perseverance
Theatre, Berkeley
Rep, Center
Theatre
Group/Kirk
Douglas Theatre,
Woolly Mammoth,
A.R.T. Many
productions with
Curtis Opera
Theatre,
Philadelphia. 2012
Obie Award for
productions. John
is the recipient of
a 2010
Guggenheim
Fellowship in
Drama and
Performance Art
and a 2011
United States
Artists Donnelley
Fellowship. In
2010 John
received the
Lucille Lortel
Award for
Outstanding
Director and the
Elliot Norton
Award for
Outstanding
Director for ERS’
production of
GATZ. John was
born in North
Carolina and
raised in Georgia.
He holds a BA in
English and
Theater Studies
from Yale.
Sustained
Excellence.
Sarah Hughes
(Production Stage
Manager/Assistan
t Director) has
been a member of
ERS since 2007.
With ERS:
Arguendo,
Shuffle, The
Sound and the
Fury (April
Seventh, 1928),
GATZ. OffBroadway: The
Misanthrope
(NYTW); Godot
in New Orleans,
365 Days/365
Plays (Classical
Theatre of
Harlem). Other
credits: Crime or
Emergency
(PS122);
Neptune, Venus,
Mercury, Saturn
(Superhero
Clubhouse); Big
Green Theater
(The Bushwick
Starr/SHC);
Dreaming Biloxi,
Breaking
E.D.E.N. (Bentley
Theater at
Dartmouth
College). Sarah
holds a BA in
Theater &
Creative Writing,
Katherine Profeta
(Dance and
Movement Coach)
With ERS: The Sound
and the Fury (April
Seventh, 1928), Cabs,
Total Fictional Lie,
Highway to
Tomorrow, Room
Tone,and more. OffBroadway: 131
(Director/Choreograp
her, PS122); King
John (Dramaturg,
TFANA); The
Geography Trilogy,
How can you stay...?
(Dramaturg, BAM).
Regional: Bat Boy
(Choreographer,
Southern Rep.)
Training: Yale
University (DFA).
ERS founding
Member and
Choreographer.
Assistant Professor at
Queens College,
CUNY.
Jason Sebastian
(Sound Engineer)
has been working
freelance in film,
theater, and music
for the last 10
years or so. With
ERS: GATZ.
Designing/composi
ng most recently
with Tara O'Con,
Red Metal
Mailbox, and he
composed the
music for 3
Legged Dog's Rods
and Cables.
Engineered and
mixed
slow/dynamite's
The Mountains Are
Our People
released on limited
double vinyl and
he designed sound
for Within Us at
PS122 for
MVWorks. You
can hear his latest
work with Ms.
O'Con during New
York's River to
River Festival,
Summer 2012.
David Zinn (Set
and Costume
Design) With
ERS: The Sound
and the Fury
(April Seventh
1928). Broadway
as Costume
Designer: Good
People, Bengal
Tiger at the
Baghdad Zoo, In
the Next Room
(Tony, Drama
Desk noms.), A
Tale of Two
Cities, Xanadu.
Off-Broadway as
Set and/or
Costume
Designer: Lincoln
Center, MTC,
NYTW,
Playwrights
Horizons, Second
Stage, MCC,
TFANA. Opera:
as Set and
Costume
Designer: L.A.
Opera, New York
City Opera,
Glimmerglass
Opera, Santa Fe
Opera,
Washington
National Opera,
Lyric Opera of
Chicago.
Regional:
Dartmouth
College.
Berkeley Rep.,
A.R.T., La Jolla,
Yale Rep, Seattle
Rep, Guthrie,
Mark Taper
Forum, Intiman.
Elevator Repair Service is a New York City-based company that creates innovative original
works for live theater with an ongoing ensemble. ERS has built a body of work that has earned it
a loyal following and made it one of New York’s most highly acclaimed experimental theater
companies. Their work has been seen across America, Europe, Australia and Asia, and they have
been the recipient of many awards including a 2012 Obie Award for Sustained Excellence; for
The Select: 2012 Lucille Lortel and Obie Awards for Sound Design (Matt Tierney and Ben
Williams); and for GATZ: 2010 Elliot Norton Awards for Outstanding Director, Outstanding
Visiting Production and Outstanding Actor (Scott Shepherd); 2011 Lucille Lortel Awards for
Alternative Theatrical Experience and Best Director; and a 2011 Obie for Scott Shepherd for
Performance. ERS is a member of TCG, the DBAA and A.R.T./New York, and a Company-inResidence at New York Theatre Workshop.
HEMINGWAY IN PARIS AND SPAIN
BY: KIMI GOFFE
In The Sun Also Rises, Hemingway describes
Paris and Spain in vivid, precise detail. This
detail comes not only from his skill as a
writer but also from personal experience.
Streets, cafés, train rides, bullfights, the
feeling of the air during a particular season –
Hemingway experienced all these things
while living in Paris and visiting Spain in the
1920s.
Paris
Ernest
Heming
way
"There is never any ending to
Paris and the memory of each
person who has lived in it differs
from that of any other. We
always returned to it no matter
who we were nor how it was
changed nor with what
difficulties nor what ease it could
be reached. It was always worth
it and we received a return for
whatever we brought to it”
(A Moveable Feast 236).
first
Hemingway in Paris c. 1924; photo courtesy
of the Ernest Hemingway Collection at the
John F. Kennedy Library and Museum,
Boston.
went to Paris as a soldier in WWI. In
December 1921, he moved there with his
first wife, Hadley Richardson, after being
told by his friend and fellow writer
Sherwood Anderson that “Paris was the
place an aspiring young writer should live”
(Mellow 141).
Paris was a cultural hub, host to artists like
Pablo Picasso, Djuna Barnes, James Joyce and Ford Madox Ford. Hemingway
immersed himself in the city, quickly becoming part of its literary scene. He met
Gertrude Stein (who became his mentor) and frequented her salon where he
befriended Ezra Pound and F. Scott Fitzgerald. He worked as a foreign
correspondent for the Toronto Star while there, writing about everything from the
wild bohemian lifestyle of expats in Paris to the rise of Fascism in Italy. He
borrowed books from Sylvia Beach, an American expat bookseller and publisher
who owned the famed Shakespeare and Company bookstore, and voraciously read
Turgenev, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, and Stendhal.
Paris was Hemingway’s training ground as a young writer. He described himself
as working “in the full-time job of learning to write prose” (A Moveable Feast
86). His first book, Three Stories and Ten Poems, was published there in 1923.
Despite not having very much money, he lived well, describing himself as “very
poor and very happy” (AMF 220). “To have come on all this new world of
writing,” he wrote, “ with time to read in a city like Paris where there was a way
of living well and working, no matter how poor you were, was like having a great
treasure given to you” (AMF 102). Even after he left in 1928, Paris was the city
Hemingway loved most. He spent the last years of his life writing and editing A
Moveable Feast, his memoir of 1920s Paris, which was published posthumously
in 1964.
Spain
Hemingway’s relationship to Spain centered on bullfighting.
Ever since he heard Gertrude Stein’s stories of sitting in the
front row at the Valencia bullring, Hemingway had been
fascinated by the ritual danger of bullfighting. In 1923, he
made his first visit to Pamplona and saw the bullfights for
himself.
For Hemingway, bullfighting was not mere entertainment. It
was an opportunity to witness the drama and violence of life
distilled into a ceremonial art form, an experience he hoped
would feed his writing: “I was trying to learn to write,
commencing with the simplest things, and one of the simplest
Hemingway posing in
a corrida, Ronda,
Spain, 1923; photo
courtesy of the Ernest
Hemingway Collection things of all and the most fundamental is violent death”
at the John F. Kennedy (Death in the Afternoon 2). The bullrings were the only place
Library and Museum,
he could see this kind of violent death, “now that the wars
Boston.
were over” and so he needed to go to Spain to “study it”
(DITA 2). He became a real aficionado, a “lover of the bullfight” (DITA 9),
someone who saw not only tragedy and horror in them, but also beauty and art.
He returned to see the bullfights many times, eventually writing an entire book
about them, Death in the Afternoon, published in 1932.
At the end of Death in the Afternoon, Hemingway included a section listing
everything he loved about Spain: “days on the train in August with the blinds
pulled down on the side against the sun and the wind blowing them”, “the noise
in the streets in Madrid after midnight”, “the taste of horchata”, “cool walking
under the palms in the old city on the cliff above the sea” (270 -275). In the
1930s, he returned to report on the Spanish Civil War, an experience that fuelled
his novel For Whom the Bell Tolls. He continued to visit often, making his final
trip in 1959 to write a piece on bullfighting for Life magazine, one of his last
writing assignments before his death in 1961.
Learn More
Fitch, Noël Riley. Walks in Hemingway’s Paris: A Guide to Paris for the Literary
Traveler. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1989.
Hemingway, Ernest. A Moveable Feast: The Restored Edition. New York:
Scribner, 2009.
Hemingway, Ernest. The Sun Also Rises. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons,
1989.
Hemingway, Ernest. Death in the Afternoon. New York: Scribner, 2003.
Mellow, James. Hemingway: A Life Without Consequences. New York: Houghton
Mifflin Company, 1992.
Brief Biography of Ernest Hemingway:
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1954/hemingway
-bio.html
“THE LOST GENERATION”
BY: KIMI GOFFE
“You are all a lost generation.” —Gertrude Stein in conversation.
This
epigraph
to The
Sun Also
Rises
attributes
the term
“lost
generatio
n” to
Hemingway recuperating from a Gertrude Hemingway with friends at a café in Pamplona, Spain.
war injury in Milan, Italy. Photo Stein,
Photo courtesy of the Ernest Hemingway Collection at
courtesy of the Ernest
the John F. Kennedy Library and Museum, Boston
whom
Hemingway Collection at the
John F. Kennedy Library and
Hemingw
Museum, Boston.
ay befriended in 1920s Paris. The term originated from
an experience at a garage, when the young man fixing
Stein’s car was not being particularly helpful. The garage owner chastised him,
saying, “You are all a génération perdue.” Stein agreed with the owner, later
telling Hemingway that “All of you young people who served in the war. You are
a lost generation” (A Moveable Feast 61).
WWI damaged Hemingway and his peers physically, emotionally and
psychologically. As historian Robert Wohl describes, “What bound the generation
of 1914 together was not just their experiences during the war...but the fact that
they grew up and formulated their first ideas in the world from which the war
issued” (The Generation of 1914 210). The characters in The Sun Also Rises
exemplify this generation: wounded, disillusioned and disinterested, with
unstable lives and relationships weakened by a lack of intimacy and
communication.
Later in life, Hemingway rejected the term, writing in his memoir, A Moveable
Feast, “to hell with [Stein’s] lost-generation talk and all the dirty, easy labels”
(AMF 62). Who was Stein to judge? How could a previous generation that had
never seen such a war understand what Hemingway and his peers went through?
“Who is calling who a lost generation?” he asked, concluding that “all
generations were lost by something” (AMF 62).
The term “Lost generation” has resurfaced periodically to describe generations of
people who came of age in the aftermath of a major traumatic event, including
economic turmoil or crisis. In the 1990s, journalists used the term to refer to
Japanese youth who grew up during the Japanese recession, a decade of
widespread unemployment. This economic hardship was blamed for intense social
withdrawal and high suicide rates seen among that age group. In the wake of the
recent global economic recession, the term has also been applied to the current
crop of recent graduates in the U.S. and across Europe struggling to find jobs
amidst staggering unemployment rates. Harvard economist Richard Freeman has
said, “These people will be scarred, and they will be called the ‘lost generation’ ...their careers would not be the same way if we had avoided this economic
disaster” (The Atlantic Wire 9/22/11). According to Freeman, a sense of
uncertainty and fear about the future, lack of tangible outcomes for hard work,
and heightened desperation characterize this generation.
The resurgent use of the phrase “lost generation” demonstrates that Hemingway
identified an enduring cultural trend and deep social fear in The Sun Also Rises.
While the novel is certainly a portrait of a far-gone era, the central questions of
lost youth, lost innocence, and lost purpose are startlingly relevant in the present
day.
Learn More
Baker, Carlos. Hemingway: The Writer As Artist. Princeton: Princeton Univers ity
Press, 1972.
Wohl, Robert. The Generation of 1914. Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
1979.
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-03-29/spains-lost-generationlooks-abroad
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/national/2011/09/american-youth-lostgeneration/42814/#
http://money.cnn.com/2011/05/17/news/economy/recession_lost_generation/in
dex.htm
FIESTA: BULL FIGHTING IN
PAMPLONA
History of Fiesta de San Fermin:
Although the first official bullring was not
Hemingway (leaning forward) at a bullfight
in Pamplona; photo courtesy of the Ernest
Hemingway Collection at the John F.
Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum,
Boston.
July. Over the years, the Fiesta de
constructed in Pamplona until 1844, records
of bullfighting in the city go back to the 14th
century, when cattle merchants brought their
stock to town to sell at annual secular
festivals. These originally took place in
October, but by the end of the 16th century,
the festivals merged with the religious
festival honoring Saint Fermin, and moved to
San Fermin grew into a 8-day celebration
marked by excessive drinking and debauchery. Perhaps the most famous element
of the fiesta, el Encierro, or “the running of the bulls,” came into being in the late
17th century, about the same time that the fiesta began to attract foreign visitors.
Today, the Fiesta de San Fermin attracts over 1.5 million people each year.
Elements of a bullfight:
The stars of a bullfight are undeniably the Matadors. The
goal of the Matador is not simply to kill the bull in the ring,
but rather to offer a show of controlled personal danger to
the crowd. Dressed in a traditional Traje de Luces (“suit of
light”) a Matador begins his performance by offering the bull
a target in the form of a large cape. As the bull charges the
cape, the Matador performs a series of “passes,” ideally
decreasing the distance between himself and the bull with
each pass, and remaining stoic in the face of danger. After a
Kaneza Schaal as the
series of these death-defying passes, the Matador’s assistants Matador Belmonte in
join him in the fight. The Picadors, on horeseback, spear the The Select (The Sun
Also Rises). Photo by
bull with lances to weaken it. (Although modern day
Rob Strong.
bullfights require the horses to wear protective padding, in
Hemingway’s day horses were often injured and killed by the bulls during this
part of the fight.) After the bull has been speared several times by the Picadors,
the Bandilleros approach the bull on foot, andstab brightly colored sticks with
barbed ends into the bulls’ shoulder blades. This causes the bull to keep its head
down, offering a better target for the Matador’s sword. The Matador now returns
to the ring, and, using a much smaller cape, performs another series of passes,
further decreasing the space between himself and the bull’s horns. Finally, the
Matador draws his sword and plunges it into the small space between the bull’s
shoulder blades, killing the bull. The entire encounter lasts about 15 minutes, and
each bullfighting performance features three Matadors, each with two chances to
fight a bull.
Hemingway’s Aficion:
Hemingway first became an aficionado of
bullfighting in 1923, after his friend Gertrude
Stein urged him to attend. Though he initially
thought the bullfights “would be simple and
barbarous and that [he] would not like them,” he
became extremely passionate about the sport.
Hemingway with a Bull in San Sebastian,
Spain, 1927; photo courtesy of the Ernest
Hemingway Collection at the John F.
Kennedy Presidential Library and
Museum, Boston.
He brought his first wife, Hadley, to the fights
in the hopes that it would positively affect their
unborn child, and even participated in amateur
bullfights himself. In 1932, Hemingway
returned to Pamplona to research Death in the
Afternoon, an entire volume about the intricacies of bullfighting. In that book, he
defines an aficionado as “One who understands bullfights in general and in detail
and still cares for them,” a quality he associated with “the most intelligent part of
the public.” According to Elevator Repair Service Director, John Collins, “A
bullfight is very Hemingway in a way. It’s something that is gory and cruel and
upsetting, and it’s also this beautiful dance. It’s this incredible pageantry and
design and performance coming together in something that’s startling and
shocking and cruel. In that sense, it really does sum up the whole novel [of The
Sun Also Rises].”
Learn more about bullfighting, or the Fiesta de San Fermin:



Hemingway, Ernest. Death in the Afternoon. New York, New York:
Charles Scribner's Sons, 1932.
Kennedy, A.L. On Bullfighting. New York: Vintage/Anchor, 2001.
McCormick, John. Bullfighting: Art, Technique, and Spanish Society.
Edison, NJ:Transaction Publishers, 1999.
CURRICULUM STANDARDS
According to the NJ Department of Education, “experience with and
knowledge of the arts is a vital part of a complete education.” Our production
of The Select and the activities outlined in this guide are designed to enrich
your students’ education by addressing the following specific Core
Curriculum Content Standards for Visual and Performing Arts:
1.1
The Creative Process: All students will demonstrate an understanding of the elements and
principles that govern the creation of works of art in dance, music, theatre, and visual art.
1.2
History of the Arts and Culture: All students will understand the role, development, and
influence of the arts throughout history and across cultures.
1.3
Performance: All students will synthesize those skills, media, methods, and technologies
appropriate to creating, performing, and/or presenting works of art in dance, music, theatre, and
visual art.
1.4
Aesthetic Responses & Critique Methodologies: All students will demonstrate and apply an
understanding of arts philosophies, judgment, and analysis to works of art in dance, music,
theatre, and visual art.

Viewing The Select and then participating in the pre- and post-show
discussions and activities suggested in this audience guide will also
address the following Core Curriculum Content Standards in Language
Arts Literacy:
3.1
Reading: All students will understand and apply the knowledge of sounds, letters, and words in
written English to become independent and fluent readers, and will read a variety of materials
and texts with fluency and comprehension.
3.2
Writing: All students will write in clear, concise, organized language that varies in content and
form for different audiences and purposes.
3.3
Speaking: All students will speak in clear, concise, organized language that varies in content
and form for different audiences and purposes.
3.4
Listening: All students will listen actively to information from a variety of sources in a variety
of situations.
3.5
Viewing and Media Literacy: All students will access, view, evaluate, and respond to print,
non-print, and electronic texts and resources.

In addition, the production of The Select as well as the audience guide
activities will help to fulfill the following Core Curriculum Content
Standards in Social Studies:
World History/Global Studies: All students will acquire the knowledge and skills to think
analytically and systematically about how past interactions of people, cultures, and the
environment affect issues across time and cultures. Such knowledge and skills enable students
to make informed decisions as socially and ethically responsible world citizens in the 21st
century.
6.2

“History of…The Festival of San Fermin.” Government of Navarre.

http://www.turismo.navarra.es/eng/propuestas/sanfermines/desarrollo/fiesta.htm
Palin, Michael. “Michael Palin’s Hemingway Adventure,” PBS.org
http://www.pbs.org/hemingwayadventure/spain.html
BEFORE THE SHOW
Educators: We recommend that you use one or more of the assignments and
activities in this document to introduce your students to The Select and its
context, and themes, as well as to engage their imaginations and creativity before
they see the production.