In 1926: living at the edge of time - Monoskop

ACTION VS. IMPOTENCE
In Hemingway's novel The Sun Also Rises, Jake Barnes, the first-person
narrator, and his friend Bill Gorton, a rising star in the literary circles of
New York, go trout fishing on the Spanish side of the Basque Pyrenees.
It's cold in the little hotel where they spend the night, and since Bill is
convinced that wine and liquor alone won't "keep us warm permanently,"
they order a hot rum punch: "I went out and told the woman
what a hot rum punch was and how to make it. In a few minutes a girl
brought a stone pitcher, steaming, into the room. Bill came over from
the piano and we drank the hot punch and listened to the wind. 'There
isn't too much rum in that.' I went over to the cupboard and brought
the rum bottle and poured a half-tumblerful into the pitcher. 'Direct
action,' said Bill. 'It beats legislation'" (114). What exactly is the point
of Bill's joke? Why is it "direct action" to increase the alcohol content
of a rum punch? And why does it "beat legislation"? The answer lies in
the various contexts of this gesture. Jake hasn't even asked Bill whether
he wants a stronger drink-his own certainty is sufficient for him to
make the change, wordlessly. During the hours to come, this Action will
give the two friends a feeling of warmth in a chilly environment where
people do not even know how to mix a rum punch. Pouring "a halftumblerful
[of rum] into the pitcher" far exceeds what guests in a little
hotel in the Spanish Pyrenees can normally expect.
A direct Action, then, is an Action that does not necessarily follow
from the circumstances in which it occurs. It is an Action that attracts
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