How A Traumatic, Gruesome Experience Can Affect A Person's Values

Ernest Hemingway, author of The Sun Also Rises, explores how a traumatic, gruesome experience can affect a person’s view on their own values, and how they view the values that are forced on them by their society. In the novel, the characters no longer value things such as titles and money because the war they had been involved in causes them to question the things they used to value. The characters all have different perspectives on topics such as sexuality, and money. To put it in simpler terms, the characters fail to see the value in basically everything because they can no longer tell the difference between what is valuable and what is not. In the novel, Hemingway explores the ways in which people question their values due to past experiences
The persona of Brett as a whole is a prime example of this. In a time where women are often oppressed and seen as less than when compared to men, Brett embodies the image of a strong, dominant woman since she questions a women’s place in society. The reader can concur that with Brett, she does not value the idea of sex and being in a relationship, instead, she acts very promiscuously when it comes to her relationships. Brett does not think that having an intimate relationship with someone means that you have to have a serious relationship. Brett does not let her sex life undermine her value as a woman, and this can be seen when she states ““Oh, well. What if I do?” when Jake confronts her about her multiple love interests. Brett’s unfeminine approach to love and relationships allows for her to feel as if they are invaluable, and allows for her to act casually when it comes to her love life. This way of acting promiscuously when it comes to her intimate relationships is due to Brett’s past experience in the war when Brett’s true love died of dysentery. Brett runs away from forming any kind of serious relationship, because she is afraid of facing a loss like she faced in the war, and she uses it as a way to shield people from her real emotions. Also, her subsequent casual outlook toward sex and relationships can be interpreted as an inefficacious way to try and replace the value she previously had with her true love before his passing in the war. Brett rebels against how society thinks a woman should behave in a relationship because she can’t bring herself to commit to anyone because of her terrible loss. Brett not only no longer values the intimacy of sex, but also no longer values the view of what society thinks a woman should be like. She isn’t society’s traditional thought of a picturesque woman, but