Ernest Hemingway’s masterpiece The Sun Also Rises (1926) is one of the most widely read novels in American literature. It showcases the plight of the post-war generation—the ‘Lost Generation’—, facing disillusionment and anxiety. Embodied by a group of American expatriates in Europe, namely Brett, Jake, Mike, Cohn and Bill, the sense of loss is emphasised in the novel by showing that love is ephemeral and pain and death are inevitable in life.
Many critics consider The Sun Also Rises as an autobiographical novel. Indeed, many features and events concerning the character Jake Barnes remind of the author’s own war experience and personal life (1899-1961). However, the term ‘Lost Generation,’ which was coined by the American poet Gertrude Stein, one of Hemingway’s contemporaries, applies to the post-war era and youth entirely in the aftermath of World War I, as portrayed by many other authors.

“A man can be destroyed but not defeated.” Such is the message that Ernest Hemingway’s novella The Old Man and the Sea forcefully sends to the reader. When Santiago, the old Cuban fisherman, undertakes his fishing exploit, he hopes to reverse the 84-day streak of bad luck, but he heroically comes back with the greatest catch of his life. Mocked by his fellow fishermen and abandoned by Manolin, his young apprentice and friend, Santiago endures extreme pain caused by the cord around his body, and resists attacks of fierce sharks, alone amidst the vast sea, to bring a giant marlin to the shore.
The Old Man and the Sea is written in plain but forceful language. Published in 1952, it earned its author the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 and played a major part in awarding him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954.

In his novel Burmese Days (1934), George Orwell scrutinizes the contradictions of both Burman and European values, attitudes and aspirations, denouncing the disruptive effects of imperialism. In Kyauktada, upper Burma, Flory, a lonely and rather cowardly British timber merchant, feels alienated and stifled by the Europeans’ conduct and conversations. U Po Kyin, a corrupt, unscrupulous, and extremely powerful Sub-divisional Magistrate, seeks the privilege of becoming the first native member in the European Club, and so he plots to ruin his rival, Dr. Veraswami. Flory commits suicide, for he cannot withstand the humiliation he is publicly subjected to by Ma Hla May, his former Burmese mistress, as part of U Po Kyin’s schemes against the protagonist.
George Orwell was born Eric Arthur Blair in 1903 in British India, and he served in the Indian Imperial Police in Burma. He expressly condemns the British imperial system; however, he often exhibits an ambivalent attitude towards it. He died in1950.