The old man was fishing alone in his boat in the Gulf Stream. For eighty-four days he had gone to sea and had not caught a single fish. The boy was with him for the first forty days. But day after day he did not bring a catch, and the parents told the boy that the old man was now clearly salao, that is, "the most unlucky one", and ordered to go to sea in another boat, which actually brought three good fish in the first week ... It was hard for the boy to watch the old man come back with nothing every day, and he went ashore to help him carry home a tackle or a hook, a harpoon and a sail wrapped around the mast. The sail was covered with burlap patches and, rolled up, resembled the banner of a completely broken regiment.
The old man was thin and emaciated, deep wrinkles cut through the back of his head, and his cheeks were covered with brown spots of harmless skin cancer caused by the sun's rays reflected by the smooth surface of the tropical sea. The spots ran down the cheeks to the very neck, and there were deep scars on his arms, cut by the string when he pulled out a large fish. However, there were no fresh scars. They were as old as cracks in a long waterless desert. Everything he had was old, except for his eyes, and his eyes were like the color of the sea, the cheerful eyes of a man who does not give up.
Santiago, - the boy said to him, as the two of them climbed the road from the shore, where the boat was at the pier, - now I can go with you to the sea again. We've already made some money. The old man taught the boy to fish, and the boy loved him.
No, - said the old man, - you got on a lucky boat. Stay on her.
Do you remember that once you went to sea for eighty-seven days and did not catch anything, and then we brought big fish every day for three weeks in a row.
I remember, ”said the old man. - I know you left me not because you did not believe.
My father forced me, and I am still a boy and must obey.
I know, ”said the old man. - How could it be otherwise.
He doesn't really believe.
Yes, said the old man. - But we believe. Truth?
Of course. Do you want me to buy you a beer on the Terrace? And then we'll take the gear home.
Well then, said the old man. - If the fisherman brings it to the fisherman ... They sat down on the Terrace, and many fishermen made fun of the old man, but he was not offended by them. The older fishermen were sad to look at him, but they did not show their sight and conducted a polite conversation about the current, and about how deep they threw the line, and how the weather holds, and what they saw in the sea. Those who were lucky that day had already returned from their fishing, gutted their marlins and, having loaded them across two boards, taking two for each end of the board, dragged the fish to the fish depot, from where it was to be taken in a refrigerator to the market in Havana. The fishermen who caught the sharks handed them over to a shark cutting plant on the other side of the bay; there the carcasses were hung on blocks, the liver was taken out of them, the fins were cut out, the skin was flayed and the meat was cut into thin slices for pickling.
When the wind blew from the east, it brought the stench from the shark factory; but today the smell was hardly audible, for the wind had changed to the north, and then it died down, and it was sunny and pleasant on the Terrace.
Santiago, said the boy.
Yes? - answered the old man. He looked at his glass of beer and recalled days long gone.
May I get you some sardines for tomorrow?
Not worth it. Better play baseball. I can still row myself, and Rogelio will cast the nets.
No, give it to me better. If I'm not allowed to fish with you, I want to help you with something.
Why, you bought me a beer, ”said the old man. - You are already a grown man.
How old was I when you first took me to sea?
Five, and you almost died when I dragged a still living fish into the boat and it almost blew everything to pieces, remember?
I remember how she beat her tail and broke the can and how you loudly beat her with a club. I remember you threw me on the bow, where the wet tackle lay, and the boat was shaking all over, and your club was pounding like a tree was being chopped down, and there was a cloying smell of blood all around.
Do you really remember all this, or did I tell you later?
I remember everything from the very first day when you took me to sea. The old man looked at him with sun-sore, trusting and loving eyes:
If you were my son, I would risk taking you with me even now. But you have a father and a mother and you got on a lucky boat.
Let me go for some sardines after all. And I know where you can get four live baits.
I still have today's intact. I put them in a box of salt.
I'll get you four fresh ones.
One, - objected the old man.
He had never lost either hope or faith in the future, but now they grew stronger in his heart, as if a fresh wind had blown from the sea.
Two, said the boy.
Okay, two, - the old man gave up. - And you, in an hour, did not steal them?
Would steal if need be. But I bought them.
Thank you, ”the old man said.
He was too ingenuous to think about when humility came to him. But he knew that humility had come without bringing with it any shame or loss of human dignity.
If the tide doesn't change, tomorrow will be a good day, said the old man.
It will be necessary to persuade mine, too, to move away. If you come across a very large fish, we will help you.
Yours does not like to go too far from the shore.
Yes, said the boy. “But I’ll look out for something that he cannot see — well, at least the seagulls.” Then he can be persuaded to move away for the golden mackerel.
Is it really that bad with his eyes?
Almost completely blind.
Weird. He never went after turtles. They make you go blind most of all.
But you have been following the turtles to the Mosquito Coast for so many years, and your eyes are fine.
I am not an ordinary old man.
Will you have enough strength if you come across a very large fish?
I think that's enough. The main thing here is skill.
Let's take the gear home. And then I'll grab the net and go get some sardines.
They pulled the gear out of the boat. The old man carried a mast on his shoulder, and the boy carried a wooden box with skeins of tightly woven brown wood, a boat hook and a harpoon with a handle. The bait box remained at the stern along with the baton, which is used to jam large fish when they are pulled to the surface. It is unlikely that anyone would have thought of robbing the old man, but it was better to take the sail and heavy tackle home so that they would not be damp with dew. And although the old man was sure that none of the local residents would take his good, he still preferred to remove the hook from sin, and the harpoon too.
They walked up the road to the old man's hut and entered the door, which was wide open. The old man leaned the mast with the sail wrapped around it against the wall, and the boy put the tackle next to it. The mast was almost the same length as the hut, built from the leaves of the royal palm, which is called guano here. The hut had a bed, a table and a chair, and in the adobe floor a recess to cook food on charcoal. The brown walls, made of compressed fibrous leaves, were decorated with colored oleographies of the Heart of the Lord and Santa Maria del Cobre. They got him from his deceased wife. Once upon a time there was a painted photograph of his wife herself on the wall, but then the old man hid it, because looking at her was very sad. The photograph was now on a shelf in the corner, under a clean shirt. - What have you got for dinner? the boy asked.
A bowl of yellow rice with fish. Want?
No, I’m eating at home. Light a fire for you?
Do not. I'll do it myself later. Or maybe I'll eat rice like this, cold.
Can I take the net?
Of course.
There was no network for a long time - the boy remembered when they sold it. However, they both pretended every day that the old man had a net. There was no bowl of yellow rice and fish, and the boy knew that too. “Eighty-five is a lucky number,” said the old man. “How am I going to catch a thousand pound fish tomorrow?”
Ernest Hemingway's story was written in 1952, and since then has caused constant controversy over the interpretation of the main meaning of the work. The complexity of the interpretation lies in the fact that the story pays equal attention to the motives of the suffering and loneliness of a person and the victory of the heroic principle in him.
But these topics are extremely important in the life of every person. The genius of the writer lies in the fact that he shows these topics as two sides of the same coin, and the key point of the story is that Hemingway allows the reader to choose which side to look at. Exactly this can be called the creative philosophy of Hemingway- the inconsistency and duality of his works. And "The Old Man and the Sea" is called the most vivid and amazing story of the writer.
Images from the story "The Old Man and the Sea"
First of all, it is worth paying attention to the main character in the story - to the old man Santiago, who suffers constant failures throughout the story. The sail of his boat is old and incompetent, and the hero himself is an old man exhausted by life with cheerful eyes. Through the eyes of a man who doesn't give up. This is the philosophical symbolism of the story. When the reader observes how the old man fights with the fish, in the actions and words of the protagonist he sees the fatalism of man's eternal struggle... Santiago strains all his strength and, in spite of everything, continues the fight, at the end of which he wins. It is in this moment that one of the main philosophical ideas of the work is revealed, which is that "a person can be destroyed, but he cannot be defeated."
Old Man's Strength of Character
With a duel between old Santiago and the big fish, Hemingway draws our attention to the true nature of the human soul and the meaning of human life. The symbolic struggle of Santiago's personality continues when sharks attack his fish. The hero does not despair, does not give up, and despite fatigue and exhaustion, he continues to fight, to defend what he has gained with such great work. Neither the wounds on his hands, nor the broken knife prevent him from doing this. And at the moment when it becomes obvious that Santiago was unable to save the fish, a key symbol of the writer's philosophy is revealed. The hero did not save the fish, but the hero did not lose, because - he fought to the last.
The exhausted and weakened hero still returns to the port, where the boy is waiting for him. Hemingway shows us the old man as a winner and reveals the strength of his character. After all, the image of Santiago has absorbed the features of a real hero, a man who never betrays himself and his principles. The idea of the writer was to show the philosophical side of the principles of human existence, and he does this using the example of a single character and his attitude to life.
The meaning of human life in the story
This story lacks a tragic ending; the ending can be called completely open to the imagination of the readers. This is the overwhelming power of Hemingway's philosophy, it provides us with the opportunity to independently summarize the moral outcome of the story. Santiago's personality is a symbol of the strength of the heroic principle in a person and a symbol of real human victory, which does not depend on circumstances and events. Using this image, the writer reveals the meaning of human life, which can be called a struggle. The main character is indestructible, thanks to the strength of his character, spirit and life positions, it is these inner qualities that help him win, despite old age, loss of physical strength and unfavorable circumstances.
The story brought fame to the American writer Ernest Hemingway. The author himself called this work his best prose. For the first time, the world read a story about an old man and the sea in a short essay “On blue water. The Gulf Stream Letter ", which was published in the magazine" Esquire ".
Hemingway was in love with the sea, knew how to fish, from early childhood he already knew about all the plants and animals that inhabit the Midwest. But most of all, the writer loved aquatic creatures. They say that it was he who was able to catch the largest "winged" fish in the Atlantic.
The story is based on a real case. A fisherman from Cuba fished unsuccessfully for a long time near the coast of Havana, but he was still lucky to catch a huge fish. It so happened that sharks attacked the fish - and the fisherman pulled only its skeleton ashore. In this simple episode from his fishing life, the writer saw the philosophical depth. He embellished the real history with artistic details, symbols, and as a result, an instructive story-parable "The Old Man and the Sea" was published. In his letter to the publisher, Hemingway wrote that "The Old Man and the Sea" is a prose on which he worked all his life, which was conceived as light, simple and concise, but at the same time it should convey all changes in reality. The writer believed that this was the best prose he was capable of at the time.
In 1952, the work "The Old Man and the Sea" was published in the periodical "Life". Literary critics and readers were interested to know who became the prototype of the old man Santiago. The writer himself did not give an unambiguous answer, so many assumed that the prototype was an acquaintance of the author, an old fisherman from Cuba Gregorio Fuentos. This Cuban resembled the protagonist in his description. But it is more likely that the image of Santiago is collective and consists of different traits of people with whom the writer communicated in the fishing village of Kokhimare.
The main character in the story - a boat drifting in the sea - appeared for a reason. The writer spied on this image during one of his travels by sea. Eyewitnesses claimed that Hemingway became interested in a small boat that stubbornly pursued a large fish. When the captain of the ship, at the request of the writer, swam to the boat, the fisherman was cursing. He was angry that the travelers would frighten off his fish. Besides the old man, there was a boy in the boat. So, most likely, the main images of the story arose - an old man, a boy, a boat, a fish and the sea. In order not to frighten off the big fish, the ship sailed away, but Ernest Hemingway continued to follow the fishing process from afar, seeing in this something more than fishing.
The history of the creation of the story "The Old Man and the Sea" proves that the writer made a lot of efforts so that the world saw a brilliant parable about an unusual old man who was walking towards his dream. The writer, like his protagonist, also caught the "fish of his dreams", creating an amazing story. In it, Ernest Hemingway showed himself to be a philosopher who perceives life as it is - complex, but beautiful.
In the 1920s, Ernest Hemingway consistently created a large book of great losses: first the novel "Fiesta" about post-war Europe, and then "Farewell to arms!" - about the First World War. In the "war" novel, the main character is destined to lose his beloved woman. In the "peaceful" "Fiesta" the so-called "lost generation", scorched by the war, is doomed to the loss of orientations, values, illusions, to senseless vegetation. In the novel Farewell to Arms! the outbreak of feeling makes the lovers forget about the war. For the hero of "Fiesta", deprived of love and forced to "forget" about it, the war thus reminds of itself ... The First World War devalued the main words and important concepts - their original meaning was lost. That is why the author and his characters are so careful in choosing these words. That is why the most important thing is driven into subtext, into an internal monologue, not intended for prying ears. It is from here - the speech restraint and laconicism, the identification marks of Hemingway's style. In the novels "Fiesta" and "Farewell to Arms!"
Description added by user:
Marina Sergeeva
"The Old Man and the Sea" - plot
For 84 days, the old Cuban fisherman Santiago goes out to sea and cannot catch anything. And only his little friend Manolin continues to help him, although his father forbids him to fish with old Santiago. They are still friends and often talk about this and that. On the 85th day, the old man goes out to sea, as usual, on his sailing boat, and luck smiles at him - a marlin about 5.5 meters long falls on the hook. The old man regrets that there is no boy with him, it is not easy to cope alone. For several days, a real battle takes place between fish and man. The old man was able to cope with his bare hands with a fish that is longer than his boat and is armed with a sword. But the marlin takes the boat far out to sea, it's not enough to catch a fish - you still have to swim to the shore with it. For the blood from the wounds of the fish, sharks gather to the old man's boat and devour the fish. The old man enters into battle with them, but here the forces are not equal. When he reaches the shore, only one skeleton, a head and a sword remain of the fish, which Santiago gives the boy as a keepsake.
History
The story "The Old Man and the Sea" was completed by Hemingway in 1951. In it, the writer tried to convey to the readers all his life and literary experience. Hemingway created the story for a long time, painstakingly writing out every episode, every reflection and observation of his, in many ways, lyrical, hero. Then he shared what he had written with his wife Mary, and it was only by the chills on her skin that he understood how good the passage he had made. According to the writer himself, the story "The Old Man and the Sea" could well become a great novel, with many characters (mainly fishermen) and storylines. However, all this was already in the literature before him. Hemingway wanted to create something different: story-parable, story-symbol, story-life.
Reviews
Reviews of the book "The Old Man and the Sea"
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Bekka
How do you feel, fish?
I wasn't looking for what I found. The desire to get to "The Old Man and the Sea" fully took shape in me only when he was sung 5 times in a row in another work. And then I realized - it's time, it's not in vain that the rumor goes about him. Deep philosophy? Maybe ... For me? No. I admired more the monologues with the hand, with the fish, with myself. It was subtle and precise. The inner world of the old man in the palm of your hand. Ernest's distinct style from others is what I discovered.
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2 / 0
Polina Diogenova
50 grams of tenderness for change.
Growing up is when you understand that if the program in your school recommends reading any things, then most likely it is worth doing them immediately. I was always prejudiced against this, but somehow I realized that while now my time is being allocated by the Ministry of Education, it might be worth obeying and enlightening according to a template.
"The Old Man and the Sea" by Ernest Hemingway turned out to be another pleasant work that made me finally fall in love with the marine theme in American prose. It is all saturated with the calloused hands of fishermen, tart sea salt and silver fish scales.
The story is about, indeed, as Hemingway called him, an amazing old man who, most likely, sets off on the farthest voyage in his life, succumbing to the desire to catch an equally amazing fish.
Old age is not necessarily a forehead eaten away by wrinkles, dry tendons and excessive suspiciousness. “The Old Man and the Sea” whispers during the reading that there is no need to be afraid of old age, there are things that are much more interesting than the fear of decaying skin.
Many people say that this is Hemingway's most boring book, but, in my opinion, it is his most magical.
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Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea was first published in 1952. The work tells the story of an episode from the life of an old Cuban fisherman who fought on the high seas with a huge marlin, which became his biggest prey in his life. "The Old Man and the Sea" is the last known work, published during the life of the writer. The story was awarded the Pulitzer and Nobel Prizes.
main characters
Old man santiago- a fisherman who knows the sea perfectly. His "eyes were the color of the sea, the cheerful eyes of a man who does not give up."
Boy Manolin- a young fisherman whom Santiago taught to fish; loved the old man very much, took care of him.
The old man was fishing alone in the Gulf Stream. For 84 days, he did not catch a single fish. The first 40 days there was a boy with him. But the boy's parents, deciding that the old man was now "unlucky", ordered Manolin to go to the sea in another boat - "happy". “The old man was thin and haggard with deep wrinkles in the back of his head,” and his cheeks were stained with harmless skin cancer caused by the sun. There were old twine scars on his arms.
Once a boy and an old man were sitting on the terrace and drinking beer. The boy remembered how he caught his first fish at the age of 5 - he remembered everything from the very first day, when the old man took him to the sea. Santiago shared that he would go to sea tomorrow before dawn.
The old man lived very poorly in a hut made of royal palm leaves. The boy brought Santiago dinner - he didn't want the old man to fish without eating. After supper the old man went to bed. "He dreamed of Africa of his youth", its smell, brought from the shore, "distant countries and lion cubs coming ashore."
Early in the morning, after drinking coffee with the boy, Santiago went out to sea. "The old man decided in advance that he would go far from the coast." “In his mind, he always called the sea la mar, as the people who love him call him in Spanish.” "The old man constantly thought of the sea as a woman." Santiago decided today to try his luck there, "where flocks of bonito and albacore go." He threw bait hooks and slowly swam with the current. Soon the old man caught a tuna and threw it under the stern deck, concluding that it would make good bait.
Suddenly one of the rods trembled and bent down to the water - the old man realized that the marlin was caught on the bait. After waiting a little, he began to jerk the woods. However, the fish turned out to be too big and dragged the boat behind it in tow. She will die soon, the old man thought. "She cannot swim forever." But after 4 hours the fish was still leaving the sea, and the old man was still standing, holding the taut forest. He carefully sat down on the mast, resting and trying to conserve his strength.
After sunset it got colder, and the old man threw a sack over his back. The lights of Havana began to fade, from which Santiago concluded that they were going further and further east. The old man regretted that the boy was not with him. “You can't let a person be alone in old age,” he thought. "However, this is inevitable."
The old man wondered how much money this big fish would bring him if it had tasty meat. Before sunrise, I pecked at one of the baits behind my back. To prevent another fish from picking a big one for him, he cut through the forest. The old man again regretted that the boy was not with him: "You can only rely on yourself." At some point, the fish jerked violently, he fell down and cut his cheek. At dawn, the old man noticed that the fish was heading north. It was impossible to pull behind the forest - from the jerk the wound could widen and “if the fish emerged, the hook could break out completely”.
The fish suddenly dashed and knocked the old man down. When he felt the forest, he saw that blood was flowing from his hand. Moving the wood to his left shoulder, he washed off the blood - the abrasion was just on the part of the hand that he needed for work. This upset him. The old man peeled the tuna caught yesterday and began to chew. His left hand cramped completely. “I hate it when my hand is cramping,” he thought. - Own body - and such a catch!
Suddenly, the old man felt that the thrust had weakened, the forest slowly went up and fish began to appear on the surface of the water. “She was all burning in the sun, her head and back were deep purple.<…>Instead of a nose, she had a sword, long as a baseball stick, and sharp at the end, like a rapier. " The fish was two feet longer than the boat. The old man "saw many fish weighing over a thousand pounds, and caught two such fish himself, but never had to do it alone."
Although the old man did not believe in God, in order to catch this fish, he decided to read “Our Father” ten times and “Theotokos” as many times. The sun was going down, and the fish kept swimming.
The old man caught a mackerel - now he has enough food for the whole night and another day. The pain that the rope inflicted on him turned into a dull ache. He could not tie the string to the boat - so that it would not break from the jerk of the fish, he had to constantly weaken the pull with his own body. The old man decided to get some sleep, taking the forest with both hands. He dreamed of a huge flock of porpoises, and then a yellow sandbank and lions emerging onto it. He woke up from a jerk - the forest was rapidly leaving the sea. The fish began to jump, the boat rushed forward. The fish was heading downstream. The old man regretted that his left hand was weaker than his right.
"The sun has risen for the third time since he went out to sea, and then the fish began to circle." The old man began to pull the forest over. Two hours passed, but the fish were still circling. The old man is very tired. Towards the end of the third lap, the fish surfaced thirty yards from the boat. Her tail "was larger than the largest sickle." Finally, the prey was at the edge of the boat. The old man raised his harpoon high and plunged the fish into the side. She rose high above the water, "it seemed that she was hanging in the air above the old man and the boat," then threw herself into the sea, flooding the fisherman and the whole boat with water.
The old man felt sick, but when he came to himself, he saw that the fish was lying on its back, and around the sea was painted with its blood. After examining the prey, the old man concluded: "It weighs at least half a tone." The old man tied the fish to the boat and headed home.
An hour later, he was overtaken by the first shark - sailed to the smell of blood that flowed from the wound of the killed fish. Seeing the shark, the old man prepared a harpoon. The predator has sunk its jaws into the fish. The old man threw a harpoon at the shark and killed it. "She took about forty pounds of fish with her," the old man said aloud. The shark dragged his harpoon and the rest of the rope to the bottom. Now blood was flowing from the fish again - others would come for this shark. It seemed to the fisherman as if a shark rushed at him.
Two hours later, he spotted the first of the two sharks. He lifted the oar with a knife tied to it and stabbed the predator in the back, and then stabbed the knife in her eyes. The old man lured the second shark, he had to stab it several times before the predator died. The fish has become much lighter. "They probably took with them at least a quarter of the fish, and the best meat at that."
"The next shark came alone." The old man hit her with an oar and knife, the blade broke. "The sharks attacked him again just before sunset." There were two of them - the old man beat the predators with a club until they swam away. “He didn't want to look at the fish. He knew that half of it was gone. "
The old man decided to fight until he died. He "saw the city lights glow at about ten o'clock in the evening." At midnight, the fisherman was attacked by a whole flock of sharks. "He hit the heads with a truncheon and heard the jaws clang and the boat shake when they grab fish from below." When the club was gone, he tore the tiller out of the nest and began to beat the sharks with it. When one of the sharks swam up to the fish's head, the old man realized that "it's all over." Now the boat was sailing easily, but "the old man thought of nothing and felt nothing." “At night, sharks pounced on the gnawed skeleton of fish, like gluttons grabbing scraps from the table. The old man ignored them. "
Santiago entered the little cove when the lights on the Terrace were already extinguished. Heading for his hut, he turned around and in the light of the lantern saw the huge tail of a fish and the bare line of the spine. The boy came to him while he was still asleep. Seeing the old man's hands, Manolin burst into tears.
"Many fishermen gathered around the boat," one of the fishermen measured the skeleton - "It was eighteen feet from nose to tail."
The boy brought hot coffee to the old man. The old man allowed Manolin to take the sword of the fish as a keepsake. The boy said that they were looking for the old man, and now they will fish together, because he still has a lot to learn. Manolin promised Santiago: "I will bring you happiness."
A tourist who came to the Terrace asked what kind of skeleton lay near the shore. The waiter replied, "Sharks," and was about to explain what had happened. However, the woman only showed her companion in surprise: "I did not know that sharks have such beautiful, gracefully curved tails!" ...
“Upstairs, in his hut, the old man was sleeping again. He slept face down again and was guarded by a boy. The old man dreamed of lions. "
Conclusion
The main character of the story "The Old Man and the Sea" - the fisherman Santiago appears before the reader as a strong-willed, purposeful, internally strong man who does not give up even in the most difficult situation. The old man is portrayed as part of the spontaneous world of nature, even in his appearance the author draws parallels with the sea, for a fisherman it is natural, “his own environment”. Although at the end of the story, Santiago is actually defeated, but in the highest sense he remains undefeated: “But man was not created to suffer defeat. A person can be destroyed, but he cannot be defeated. "
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Retelling rating
Average rating: 4.7. Total ratings received: 297.