In Ernest Hemingway’s The Old Gentleman and the Sea, ” Santiago is a well used fisherman attempting for a get after a great eighty-four day time dry spell. The old mans “sail was patched with flour carriers, and, furled, it appeared as if the flag of everlasting defeat. ” But the old fart wasn’t concerned—he had gone eighty-seven days before without a catch, and to him, this was a brand new challenge and never a matter of luck as the other fishermen teased and taunted. It is this attitude that defines Santiago as some thing other than an old man within a fishing boat, trolling the sea.
In this, Santiago’s struggle with characteristics, his struggle for endurance, show that how, such as the prey this individual seeks, the old man symbolizes something much larger. In the beginning, Santiago is just a vintage man for sea with nothing to show for his efforts. When he results in the mythological marlin, both equally begin to determine man’s have difficulties within nature.
Santiago’s struggle with the marlin turns into epic, transcending all the other major moments in Santiago’s lifestyle as Santiago speaks aloud to the marlin: “fish…I’ll stick to you until I i am dead.
” He knows there is something unique about this capture, something that is due to his dedication to the fish itself, and, he knows, the seafood to him. Every approach he makes is to befriend the marlin, to keep him on the line only long enough pertaining to Santiago to make the final maneuver. In this, nevertheless, Santiago understands his place. He simply cannot catch the marlin with no marlin allowing it to be thus. While gentleman can fight and conquer nature, this kind of aspect of Santiago and the marlin demonstrate that both must work together, even to the end. Moreover, the two Santiago and the marlin will be in an legendary struggle for survival.
Santiago because he provides caught absolutely nothing for more than 80 days, and the marlin simply for instinctual reasons; yet , as Santiago thinks, “he took the bait like a male and he brings like a guy, and his combat has no worry in it. I imagine he offers any strategies or if perhaps he is as desperate as I am. ” The marlin, in this instant, becomes more a fish in the ocean. The marlin is now a personality within the story, a character being invested in, and as the marlin fights, the question of who will win starts to loom.
Genuinely, who has more to lose? As the struggle plays out, it becomes obvious that while the marlin can be defeated, so too is Santiago—by an adversary more subtle than the sea itself. In fact it is through this losing have difficulty that Santiago and the marlin can be completely compared—as equally were conquered by the same enemy. Ultimately, Santiago loses his fight with the great marlin to the sharks. Both fought against bravely and struggled hard, but in the end, both Santiago and the marlin lost.
Various critics make note that equally Santiago plus the marlin can be viewed as symbolic Christian figures. Santiago because he fights against evil (the sharks) and yet, if he returns home, feeling beaten and ruined by his long battle and even longer time at sea, Santiago reflects on existence as it is—and comes to the final outcome that though he was defeated, there was you can forget noble make an effort made than his. The marlin, as well, can be viewed as a Christian image in that it can be as courageous as Santiago, battling Santiago with a sense of teaching, endurance, and instruction.
Moreover, the marlin was literally eaten by the wicked that conquer Santiago. Nevertheless , the marlin’s head is still as a mark of the superb struggle—and however, evil sharks could not take that aside. Overall, Ernest Hemingway’s “The Old Man plus the Sea” is known as a tale of immense have difficulties, both between man and nature, and man wonderful place within just nature. Santiago is like the marlin that he efforts to capture in that both are battling for the similar purpose—survival, and both seem to teach the other during the epic moments.
Santiago knows that he is just an instant from losing his prize capture, knowing also, that he must allow the marlin to be captured in its own time. However despite the have difficulty and the endurance of equally Santiago plus the marlin, both are destroyed by an even greater nasty. Yet, right at the end of the account, with Santiago reflecting plus the marlin’s mind as the remaining catch, equally survive. Bibliography. Hemingway, Elizabeth. (1975). The Old Man plus the Sea. Birmingham: Hueber Verlag.
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