Down-stairs we came out through the first-floor dining-room to the street. A waiter went for a taxi. It was hot and bright. Up the street was a little square with trees and grass where there were taxis parked. A taxi came up the street, the waiter hanging out at the side. I tipped him and told the driver where to drive, and got in beside Brett. The driver started up the street. I settled back. Brett moved close to me. We sat close against each other. I put my arm around her and she rested against me comfortably. It was very hot and bright, and the houses looked sharply white.

We turned out onto the Gran Via.

"Oh, Jake," Brett said, "We could have had such a damned good time together."

Ahead was a mounted policeman in khaki directing traffic. He raised his baton. The car slowed suddenly pressing Brett against me. "Yes," I said. "Isn't it pretty to think so?"

Basic set up:

This is the most awesome ending to any book, ever.

Oops, we got a little carried away there. This is the ending to The Sun Also Rises. "Isn't it pretty to think so," though, is a pretty sweet shutdown: 

"Hey, sugarlips, you should give me a kiss." "Isn't it pretty to think so?" 

"These dishes will be washed by the time we get home, buster. Or else." "Isn't it pretty to think so?"

We handpicked the perfect Lost Generation snippet for your reading pleasure, ladies and gents: the most depressing moment of the novel that introduced the world to the concept of the Lost Generation. The Sun Also Rises even has the quote "You all are a lost generation" as its dang epigraph.

What are the components of the lost generation again? Oh yeah: the young people who survived WWI and were scarred, jaded, cynical, and hard-partying. And The Sun Also Rises follows around a dude who got his man-parts blown off in WWI (scarred) as he chases around a woman who has decided to marry for money and not love (cynical), talks about the dull business that is life (jaded), and basically stays blind drunk for days on end (hard-partying).

And this ending? Well, it sums up basically the whole novel. Jake, the wounded vet, and Brett are leaving a hotel bar (where they've been drinking hard, natch) and have a depressing conversation about how maybe they could have ended up together if he had all his body parts, she wasn't set on money and taking a bunch of lovers, and they both had even a modicum of faith in the world.

Welcome to Hemingwayland, where the sentences are short, the prose is brilliant, and all the characters are at least slightly unlikeable. Oh yeah: and the subject matter is bleak.

The most important moment of the ending of The Sun Also Rises is the very ending: that chilling, cuts-you-like-a-shiv line: "Isn't it pretty to think so?" Because this line sums up the very spirit of the Lost Generation.

This line is a big fat, "if only." In the context of this scene and novel, it's saying that if only Jake weren't wounded, and Brett was less needy, they might be together. But in the larger context of the time period and the Lost Generation, it's talking about WWI and its devastating effect.

• Isn't it pretty to think that, if WWI hadn't happened, the Lost Generation would have thought of the world as a hopeful place?
• Isn't it pretty to think that if thousands of men hadn't been wounded and killed, the Lost Generation would have been less morbid?
• Isn't it pretty to think that if young men hadn't been sent off to experience the culture of Europe, they would have stayed sweet, innocent farm boys?
• Isn't it pretty to think that if everyone hadn't been shocked and horrified by the destruction of modern warfare, the Lost Generation wouldn't have had to drown their sorrows quite so thirstily?

This line was also the Lost Generation's response to their parents telling them about life pre-war. The hopeful, innocent Edwardian times were a pretty thought… but nothing more.