Jake's Masculinity - The Sun Also Rises

  There is no doubt that Jake’s injury infiltrates every part of his life, especially his relationship with women. Jake’s injury represents his lack of “masculinity”, which he is insecure about. This insecurity prompts his homophobic and racist tendencies. In a twisted way, Jake believes that the group of gay men at the bar are not using their “masculinity” to their full potential, as they are equipped with the “biological parts” to have sexual intercourse with women. Jake’s insecurity and homophobia are most evident when he is directly describing Brett in relation to other men. He does not like how the gay men at the bar are dancing around Brett and “wasting their potential”, as they even have a “better shot” with her than he does (he realizes any man has a better shot with Brett than he does). In this sense, Jake seems to be pretty possessive of Brett and feels entitled to a relationship with her. It is interesting how Jake, who is devoid of “typical masculinity”, is attracted/wants to be in a relationship with a woman with “typically more masculine”/ androgynous features.

Jake’s capacity to act mean and condescending towards Robert Cohn stems from his feeling of inadequacy and un-manliness. Cohn is “throwing away” his relationship with his wife, and allows himself to be carried along by women. Whereas, Jake has no choice. I think Jake recognizes that he is in many ways similar to Cohn, except he is in denial about this (because he sees Cohn as weak and he does not want to view himself as weak as well). It seems that Jake does not want to recognize his pain and his lack of “control” as a man. This is where the “reporter” role comes in. In class, we discussed how Jake is kind of like a reporter, and we have very little insight as to what is happening in his head. Perhaps, this makes him less reliable as a narrator, but perhaps this also makes him more objective? Anyways, I digress. Maybe we view Jake as a reporter because we only see him as the listener; the man who sits and absorbs everyone else’s pain. He is an outlet for everyone else, for Frances (who talks about her crumbling marriage), for Cohn who has no other friends, and for Brett who treats him as a mere toy. Instead of focusing on his pain, he absorbs everyone else’s, as he has no outlet of his own to release pain. Technically Brett is his only outlet because she is the only one who knows of his injury. Even then, Jake’s injury is a taboo subject in their relationship, as they use clear language to avoid spelling the injury out (like the word “it”). Further, Jake would perhaps find it demoralizing to talk about it with a “woman”. This lack of an outlet is the same problem we saw with Septimus in Mrs. Dalloway. In the twentieth century, it was dishonorable to speak about/express pain like a man, and therapy hardly existed. So then, a chain of events will inherently occur: Jake’s injury causes insecurity as he compares himself to other men, which causes repression, which causes envy, which causes his capacity to be quite mean and condescending until perhaps, there will be a breaking point of sorts. We’ll see as the novel unfolds.