Bullpen Catchers Also Rise

            Ernest Hemingway’s style in The Sun Also Rises is reflective of the very simple, spare, and plain way that makes Hemingway books so distinctive. The direct and simple style that Hemingway uses to create rich imagery of situations, especially the food and drinks in those situations, allows books like The Sun Also Rises to draw readers in by projecting characters’ exact feelings onto the reader. The reader experiences the book, the characters, and the themes because Hemingway immerses the reader in a bathtub of details and opinions. For example, Hemingway uses his distinct style to describe Brett vividly in their taxi ride together:

She was sitting up now. My arm was around her and she was leaning back against me, and we were quite calm. She was looking into my eyes with that way she had of looking that made you wonder whether she really saw out of her own eyes. They would look on and on after every one else’s eyes in the world would have stopped looking. She looked as though there were nothing on earth she would not look at like that, and really she was afraid of so many things. (Hemingway 34)

Often, Hemingway uses his extended descriptions of characters in situations to conclude something about their wellbeing, like the way he observes that, “[Brett] was afraid of so many things,” after describing how she looks at Hemingway. Furthermore, The Sun Also Rises is told in 1st person from the point of view of Hemingway himself as he relates the stories of his friends in Europe. By writing intuitively, simplistically, and from his own point of view, Hemingway’s stories make the reader feel like he is sitting down with some elderly, experienced figure, like a grandfather, and listening to a personal story that the reader is compelled to validate. Hemingway’s simple style allows him to demand truth and attention because he presents the story in a very clear, non-contradictory way that immerses the reader in the details of the story rather than in the meaning of the story.

            Robert Cohn was once World Series champion during his five year contract with the Braves. The man was only a bullpen catcher when the Braves won the championship, but he still got a ring. Cohn cared very little for baseball, but he learned it to counteract his bad grades and get into Princeton. I never met anyone on his team who remembered him. Cohn was always behind a catcher’s mask. The relief pitchers did not even remember that he was in the bullpen with them right before they went out to pitch in the World Series.

            I don’t trust bullpen catchers, especially World Series champion bullpen catchers, and I always suspected that Robert Cohn was not a Major League Baseball player, and that maybe he just bought his ring from some poor, bankrupt Braves bullpen catcher, or that maybe he stole the ring, or that he had possibly found the ring and made up the story. But, I finally tracked down the Brave general manager who could confirm the story.  

Works Cited

Hemingway, Ernest. The Sun Also Rises. New York: Scribner, 2006. Print.