FREE ESSAY ON HEMINGWAY'S OLD MAN AND THE SEA

HEMINGWAY'S OLD MAN AND THE SEA

Old Man and the Sea This part of the story has to do with Santiago against nature and the
sea. In this part of the story, he goes out and fights nature in the form of terrible
forces and dangerous creatures, among them, a marlin, sharks and hunger. He starts the
story in a small skiff and moves out in a journey to capture a fish after a long losing
streak of eighty-four days. Unfortunately his friend must desert him due to this problem
and a greater force, his parents. Santiago must go out into the danger alone. For three
harsh days and nights he fights a fish of enormous power. This is the second form of
nature he must conquer. Earlier in the story, the first part of nature is himself, for
which he must fight off his hunger. This is a harsh part of the story. He manages though
to get a few bites in the form of flying fish and dolphin of which he would like to have
salt on. This part of the story tells of a cold and harsh sea, that is, one that has
value and mystery as well as death and danger. It has commercial value as well as the
population of life in it. It is dark and treacherous though, and every day there is a
challenge. A similar story tells about a tidal pool with life called `Cannery Road'. This
part of the story has to deal with figures of Christ. It mainly deals with Santiago as
being a figure of Christ and other characters as props, that is, characters which carry
out the form of biblical themes. On the day before he leaves when he wakes up, Manolin,
his helper, comes to his aid with food and drink. Also a point that might be good is that
he has had bad luck with his goal for a great period of time and is sure it will work
this time. Later, though, when Santiago needs him for the quest he sets out to do,
Manolin deserts him, although he may not have wanted to at this time. In the novel
Santiago comes upon a force bigger than his skiff, the marlin which misleads him out far
past his intended reach. This is where he starts to lose his strength against something
which seems a greater force. Santiago has a struggle of three days, which is significent
because of the three days in Easter, and continues to fight on though his goal may not
aquire anything. This is another idea through which Christ did, a struggle to get a goal
done even though it may mean certain destruction to himself. This might accomplish
nothing but the satisfaction of doing this and also has great risks. Finally he comes
upon a painful experience with his hand which is in great pain and won't move. This is
useful in the place where Christ loses his physical self and has less to deal with. On
the third day, he recovers himself and returns to his home even though his only remaining
treasure was a broken skiff, experience, and a torn up marlin. And in the final
conclusion, you can see him dragging the mast of his skiff, a cross-like object, in his
hand. This story has a certain sequence of events, first it has a hunter vs. his prey.
This hunter does respect th e prey. Throughout the book it has this series of events:
encounter, battle, defeat, and respect for the prey. This is Hemmingway's `Code of
Honor'. This part of the novel has to do with relationships between two characters. The
first to discuss are Santiago and Manolin, Manolin being the small follower of the old
man named Santiago. Manolin is a small person that follows Santiago and listens to his
wisdom. They treat each other unfriendly though for Manolin calls the Santiago 'old man'
and he calls Manolin `boy' which seems to be absurd. In that situation I would consider
both of them to go see a doctor. The next relationship to talk about would be that
between Santiago and the village, which seems to be much better. He is given credit for
food and he also is waiting to show his greatness to the villageby catching a great fish
as soon as he can. His thought on that, though, is that any fisherman can ctach it during
the easy season but only a few can go out and catch one during the hard season. He has no
consideration for the luck, and would rather try to fish through being exact rather than
being lucky. The other relationship in this story has to do with Manolin and his parents.
Manolin seems to be very rebellious against his parents, although he does submit to their
demands. Santiago's greatest link to the village is the boy. Santiago may be poor in the
story, yet is proud. This story when compared to being imaginative is good, but in real
life is somewhat of a `Fish Story'. The part where an old man being able to load in a ton
of fish is very unimaginable. The scenario, though, is very interesting for the part of
the old man. He goes out all alone into the depths of the ocean without an idea for what
is in store. This story has good points, for when it comes to the better parts of the
story, it emphasizes by placing in mind step by step of the way he does certain actions.
The part of the story which, to the best of my belief, had no part or reference in the
story was the dream of lions on a beach of Africa, which this fisherman probably had
never even visited much less seeing lions on a beach. This was like most stories in the
main plot. First characters are introduced, then a threat reveals itself, showing true
natures of all the characters, and finally the threat is fought off or it remains,
leaving the reader in suspense. This had a good plot but needed more to go on in my
opinion. Hemingway's strong parts of this story are emphasized on vocabulary. He probably
learned these fisherman terms for he once was a fisherman in Cuba. There is one problem
to this, though. Throughout the story he uses these terms over and over although the
ordinary person, like me, would forget them after the first use of them and unfortunately
he doesn't ever re-coin the terms again throughout the book. Some vocabulary he uses
stands for sharks or the sea itself. Others he uses for bait. The main idea though in
this part is to let the reader get the feel for the life, setting and character of the
fisherman himself. This is a great move to place yet is also very hard to co-exist with
the average reader. This has some good points, though, and among them is review. The
reader must review the story and skim it in order to rethink the concept of the word.
Then he or she must return to the current position in the book and place it into the
text. The concept of vocabulary is a standard not to live by, and should not be placed
into most books unless the terms are to be used many times throughout the book. Hemingway
has merged three themes already mentioned above successfully unto this book. Among them
are figures of Christ, Nature (the sea), and a code of honor. This was challenging. The
obvious ones were nature, it's cruelty and compassion. Nature caused his hand pain yet
healed it, caused hunger yet satisfied it, and gave the fish yet reclaimed it. This is
the way nature works. Nature is actually more luck than a set of rules, for it can shift
back and forth with the greatest of ease. The second theme, religion, could not be easily
pulled from the text. The best clue to where it happens is the falls of Santiago as well
as his carrying the mast. This symbolizes the end of Christ, although Santiago on the
other hand is just retiring for the night. But it could be interpreted as the end of the
book for which it is. The code of honor is not actually probably the hardest to
interpret. It can only be pulled from context, which is the hardest to do. It has mainly
to do with the rise, battle and fall of the prey and respect following. The problem in
this is that Santiago was at fault for expanding out so far, and it was dangerous. This
is similiar to the book A Journey to the Center of the Earth, which I recently read.