The Old Man and the Sea

[Lisa]

June Group Read from our list of 100 books.
This is a short novel. I thought I would post my thoughts and try to lead a discussion.

[Lisa]

I tend to have mixed feelings about Hemingway. Some of his books are sublime and others seem to be a depiction of his previous works.

But this was beautiful.
Purely beautiful.

Santiago is an old fisherman desperate to catch something after four days. He sets sail by himself for the ultimate struggle between survival and the elements.

Hemingway uses words as great artists use paint. Each brush stroke, each color is of great value to the whole.

[Lisa]

Anybody else out there?

[Buck]

Lisa wrote: "Anybody else out there?"

"Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens". :)

I read The Old Man and the Sea last year and very much enjoyed it. I think it is an exemplar of Hemingway's style. I've read several of his books and collections of stories. For me the quality of his writing is uneven. Some are masterpieces and some, well, are not. This is one of the good ones.

Unfortunately, I didn't write a review of it when I read it and the detail of it, those things that make it inimitably Hemingway, have faded from my memory.

For those who haven't read it, and especially those who haven't read Hemingway, the Old Man and the Sea is short and Hemingway. You really should read it.

[Karlyne]

I read it about a zillion years ago, and all that I remember is that it's short and Hemingway, just like you said, Buck!

[Linda]

I'm trying to catch up on longer reads for my other groups, but I'm pretty sure I have a copy of The Old Man and the Sea hiding in the back of my bookcase I will have to pull out and try to squeeze it in. I have not read any Hemingway, so this would be my first.

[Melissa (ladybug)]

I read it a couple years ago. I remember that I liked it, but could not understand his stubbornness in not letting go of the fish. (view spoiler)[Especially when it was being devoured by the other marine animals. (hide spoiler)]

[Liv]

Just read this, and this is also my first taste of Hemingway. I really enjoyed it and the descriptive language is beautiful.
I think this book is particularly interesting as the story itself is massively open to interpretation, whether you want to really over analyse it to get a deeper meaning or simply read it just for the story, it's short, which I sometimes like to break up larger novels with a quickie inbetween, this was perfect for that! Well worth a read!

[Lisa]

Olivia wrote: "Just read this, and this is also my first taste of Hemingway. I really enjoyed it and the descriptive language is beautiful.
I think this book is particularly interesting as the story itself is mas..."
It is widely open to interpretation. What were your thoughts on possible meanings?

Melissa (ladybug) wrote: "I read it a couple years ago. I remember that I liked it, but could not understand his stubbornness in not letting go of the fish. [spoilers removed]"
I thought it was desperation. He needs this fish. To sell. To eat. To live. I also thought he had something to prove. Or that he felt there was simply no other choice.

Linda wrote: "I'm trying to catch up on longer reads for my other groups, but I'm pretty sure I have a copy of The Old Man and the Sea hiding in the back of my bookcase I will have to pull out and try to squeeze..."

It's a good Hemingway to start with.

[Lisa]

Buck wrote: "Lisa wrote: "Anybody else out there?"

"Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens". :)

I read The Old Man and the Sea last year and very much enjoyed it. I think it is an exemplar of Hemingway's style. ..."

Hullo chickens.
I think it's my favorite Hemingway thus far.

[Karlyne]

"Need" vs "want"?

[Buck]

Lisa wrote: "I think it's my favorite Hemingway thus far. "

For Whom the Bell Tolls is my favorite Hemingway, but I can't really give a good reason why. The Old Man and the Sea is right up there.

[Niecie]

Ok, maybe I am too simple - but I was underwhelmed by the book. It did n

[Lisa]

Buck wrote: "Lisa wrote: "I think it's my favorite Hemingway thus far. "

For Whom the Bell Tolls is my favorite Hemingway, but I can't really give a good reason why. The Old Man and the Sea is right up there."

I remember:-) I really didn't enjoy it. The themes were repetitive for me. I kept wondering if it was written as a response to Hemingway's multiple psychological traumas from war. It's one of those books that left me thinking more about the author's psychological state than about the story

Karlyne wrote: ""Need" vs "want"?"

In his case, I'd say need.

[Lisa]

Niecie wrote: "Ok, maybe I am too simple - but I was underwhelmed by the book. It did n"

Hey Niecie, the site didn't record all of your thoughts. What did you think was lacking?

[Karlyne]

Lisa wrote: "Buck wrote: "Lisa wrote: "I think it's my favorite Hemingway thus far. "

For Whom the Bell Tolls is my favorite Hemingway, but I can't really give a good reason why. The Old Man and the Sea is r..."

I think, although it's been years since I read this, that need really did drive the obsession!

[[deleted user]]

Just finished reading this, I enjoyed it and I liked the writing.

I think pride was the driving force behind his actions at first. He needed to show the villagers he could catch fish and his luck hadn't gone. Stubbornness took over, then obsession, he was going to do it even if it killed him.

The villagers had a lot of respect and love for this old man even though he just brought back bones.

[Longhare]

Okay, I'm late, but my copy of Of Mice and Men is AWOL, so I'm reverting to the June read.

This was required reading when I was in tenth grade, and I vividly remember how much we hated The Old Man and the Sea. My English teacher, who was wonderful, valiantly tried to teach us the rudiments of Christian symbolism with this book, but we just as doggedly argued that she was overanalyzing. "Did anybody actually ask Hemingway if he meant all this?"

All that registered with me at the time was a grungy story about an grumpy old guy, a token boy to make it "appealing" to young people, and a big fish pointlessly eaten by sharks. I was reading Hugo and Hardy and Milton on the side, so it wasn't that I didn't like literature--I just didn't like Hemingway or his fish story. My first exposure to Mr. Spartan Prose actually put me off Hemingway for a couple decades, until I had struggled through Henry James' Wings of a Dove and realized what a breath of fresh air Hemingway must have been.

So, about the Christian symbolism? Yeah, it's there, layered on thick, just like she said. In fact, it is almost as heavy-handed as it is in Cool Hand Luke (the movie--don't know about the book). The nice thing about school is, sometimes you grudgingly learn a thing that turns out to be pretty handy later on. Learning how Christian (and by extension all) symbolism works in literature--and art--allows a reader to pick up on all kinds of subtext that reveals a deeper level of meaning.

For example, on the first page, Santiago had 40 days without a fish before he was given up as unlucky. For a culture brought up in Sunday school, there is an immediate echo of Noah's 40 days of rain and Jesus' 40 days in the wilderness: Trial, deprivation, isolation, promise.

The old man is "too far out" for 3 days--Jonah was 3 days in the belly of the big fish; Jesus was 3 days in the tomb: the gestation period for rebirth.

The newspapers are the scripture of baseball, and Joe DiMaggio is the prophet and redeemer. The boy and the old man dispute points of doctrine, but they share a common faith and the boy is the disciple of the old man. He believes the old man is still supremely lucky, despite the disbelief of his family and the doubts of the other old fishermen. When Santiago battles the galanos, he makes a bat from his tiller and the episode is recounted almost in the language of sportswriting: "...he raised the club high and brought it down heavy...he struck the shark once more hard across the point of his nose...," and the first shark is out, followed by two strikes and a home run that take out the second shark.

As Santiago struggles with the fish, he lacerates his forehead in a fall, his hands are "pierced," one by a cramp the other by a cut from the line, his back bears the "lashes" or "stripes" of his line. All he is missing are the nails in his feet--but here they are supplied by DiMaggio's bone spurs. Later, as the shovel-nosed sharks appear, he cries "Ay" as a man might, "feeling the nail go through his hands and into the wood." When the old man has finished his ordeal and carried his "cross" (the mast) up to his bed, on which he lies, dead tired, with his arms outstretched, he spits (as Christ with the vinegar) and feels that "something in his chest was broken" (as was Jesus' heart before the centurion test-speared him in the chest to make sure he was dead).

But Hemingway wasn't writing a tract or an allegory. He was using a culturally familiar set of images to evoke the reader's own meditations on a raft of deeply human questions. If the old man is tempted into deeper waters, if the fish is man's beastial--sinful--nature that must die and be stripped away, why does the old man love the fish and call him brother? Why does the old man wish he could feed the fish, even be the fish, and why does he wish he had not killed the fish? If the satanic dentuso that rises from the abyss is the devil, why is he (and his lesser brethren) the instrument to strip away the old man's fish (if the fish is indeed analogous to sin)? Why does his boat sail lighter without the burden? And why is the old man so dismissive of the proof of his ordeal?

I don't think it is obsession that drives the man. He is a fisherman, and if his luck has abandoned him, then he is no longer a fisherman but a man without an identity. What accountant hasn't worried about being put out to pasture by his partners? He defines himself by his ability to catch fish, and he knows that he can reclaim his luck with patience and skill. Call it temptation or hubris, but the big fish proved that he was still a fisherman, and not just any fisherman, but the Joe DiMaggio of fisherman. By morning, there is already a new chapter and verse going around his village about him, though of course the tourists get it all wrong.

[Karlyne]

Cool Hand Luke heavy on Christian symbolism?! I'm going to have to re-watch it, because I certainly missed it the first time around (when it was new and I was young) Wait! The eggs! A Christian symbol! (Sorry, I'm laughing uncontrollably here. Wheeze.)

[Karlyne]

By the way, I thought your review excellent.

[Longhare]

Thank you, Karlyne. Any reason is a good reason to watch Cool Hand Luke again. Such a great movie.

[Buck]

I too think your review is excellent, though I go along the the Joe DiMaggio part and the self identity part more than the religion part.

I know there is some christian references in Cool Hand Luke (the movie) but I chalked it up to the story being in the bible belt, not deeper symbolism. I want to read Cool Hand Luke because of the similarities I was of it to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

[[deleted user]]

Longhare - that was a great review, thank you

[Christopher]

Longhare - love your review. (hope you are still active)

I thought of the actual catching of the fish as a metaphor for life (looking at some of your questions toward the end). As he toils alone for the promise of something great, he imagines that he must become the task/object completely before he deserves it. Then after he has achieved, sharks come who would not have walked this path themselves.

[Buck]

I still can't figure how Men Without Women made the bookmark list instead of any of several of his other works, including The Old Man and The Sea.