A Defense of Brett

Through class discussions, I can tell that the overall opinion of Brett is overwhelmingly negative, for good reasons. She has been an asshole treating men throughout the story poorly by leashing them along without fulling committing to either one. In the middle of a fling with one guy, she easily moves on to another person. By today's standards, this type of relationship is immoral as every one of Brett's relationships are one sided. The men are deeply in love and stay faithful while Brett shows no commitment leading the men to act like tortured souls. It is perfectly reasonable to find aversion to this because a lot of people are taught to stay faithful to their partner.

But in defense of Brett, I think its the men who pursue Brett at more fault than Brett herself when it comes to her dysfunctional relationships because Brett loves being non-exclusive while all the other men just want her for themselves. I think open relationships are perfectly fine as long as both partners agree to it. Every man who falls for Brett knows how she works; she isn't the type of girl who sticks with one guy considering how she is engaged to Mike and married to Lord Ashley. As such, Mike, Cohn, and Jake all knew what they were getting into and yet they stayed in her sphere of influence. They are torturing themselves. When Cohn tricked himself into thinking that Brett actually loved them, it was his romantic idealism and naiveté that got him into his situation of perpetual suffering. For Mike, it was his fault that he got himself trapped inside an engagement with Brett.

Another argument used against Brett is how poorly she treats Jake and how she manipulates him to do stuff for her. It seems as if Brett gives absolutely nothing to Jake while Jake puts out his life for her. I do think that Brett gets most out of the relationship, but Jake does get something. For one, Brett provides emotional support, like during the scene after the count went to get champagne. I also assume that during the war, Brett provided a LOT of emotional support as Jake was recovering from his injury. Second, I believe that Jake receives a purpose and satisfaction of life from helping Brett. His purpose in life becomes making Brett happy and letting her get what she wants. Although this purpose in life isn't for himself or very grandeur, it is still a purpose that Jake feels meaningfully connected to because of his intense love for Brett.

Comments

  1. AlbertOctober 12, 2017 at 5:25 PM

    I find this analysis interesting. I agree that Brett is not all that bad, as she is simply looking for pleasure and we can't really judge her for doing that. Also, she has a unmistakable charisma in the book, evident by the way that she treats the men around her, makes the novel all the more interesting and compelling. I personally don't dislike Brett as a character (though in real life that's a different scenario). She is crucial to the plot of the novel, and I personally quite enjoyed the various tensions that she introduced into the novel.

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  2. Gus MansfieldOctober 14, 2017 at 9:52 PM

    I agree that it's kind of shitty on the guys' part to expect her to completely change her ways for them, but I think Brett is the most at fault. First of all, she cheats all the time and flaunts it in front of her fiancé. Also, she treats Jake like crap. Brett manipulates him and keeps him close just so that she can get the attention he gives her. But then again, I could also see where you could like her

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