Jake’s dinner with Cohn and Frances establishes the novel’s recurrent
motif of a controlling female overpowering a weak male. Although
Cohn may want to go to Strasbourg, he refuses Jake’s offer because
it would make Frances uncomfortable if he spent time with another
woman. Frances controls Cohn and his movements, and he does not,
or cannot, stand up to her. This pattern of a strong woman dominating
a weak man appears as part of the novel’s broad theme of weakened
masculinity, which Hemingway explores throughout The Sun
Also Rises.
Finally, these chapters offer the first introduction
to Hemingway’s sparse and unadorned prose style. Hemingway rarely
uses metaphors or similes to communicate the action of the novel. Instead,
he relies on direct, short, simple sentences. His dialogue is brief
as well. Characters seldom speak more than a sentence or two at
a time. Yet this seemingly minimalist style expresses much through
implication and suggestion. We can infer much about Jake, for example,
through his descriptions of other people. The details Hemingway
chooses to include, although few, are invariably quite revealing.
