Analysis of Life Philosophy in The Old Man and the Sea.doc

Analysis of Life Philosophy in The Old Man and the SeaI. Introduction A. About the AuthorErnest Hemingway(1899-1961), born in Oak Park,Illinois, was an American novelist, short-story writer,and journalist of the 20th century. Whose deceptively simple prose style have influenced wide range of writers.He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for The Old Man and the Sea, and the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954.Ernest Hemingway his mother Grace Hall, whom he never forgave for dressing him as a little girl in his youth, had an operatic career before marrying Dr. Clarence Edmonds Hemingway, he taught his son to love out-door life. Hemingways father took his own life in 1928 after losing his healt to diabetes and his money in the Florida real-estate bubble. Hemingway attended the public schools in Oak Park and published his earliest stories and poems in his high school newspaper. Upon his graduation in 1917, Hemingway worked six months as a reporter for The Kansas City Star. He then joined a volunteer ambulance unit in Italy during World War I. In 1918 he suffered a severe leg wound. For his service, Hemingway was twice decorated by the Italian government. On July 8, 1918, not yet 19 years old, he was injured on the Austro-Italian front at Fossalta di Piave. Decorated for heroism and hospitalized in Milan, he fell in love with a Red Cross nurse, Agnes von Kurowsky, who declined to marry him. These were experiences he was never to forget.After recuperating at home, Hemingway renewed his efforts at writing, for a while worked at odd jobs in Chicago, and sailed for France as a foreign correspondent for the Toronto Star. Advised and encouraged by other American writers in ParisF. Scott Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, Ezra Poundhe began to see his nonjournalistic work appear in print there, and in 1925 his first important book, a collection of stories called In Our Time, was published in New York City; it was originally released in Paris in 1924. In 1926 he published The Sun Also Rises, a novel with which he scored his first solid success. A pessimistic but sparkling book, it deals with a group of aimless expatriates in France and Spainmembers of the postwar Lost Generation, a phrase that Hemingway scorned while making it famous. This work also17introduced him to the limelight, which he both craved and resented for the rest of his life. Hemingways The Torrents of Spring, a parody of the American writer Sherwood Andersons book Dark Laughter, also appeared in 1926.The writing of books occupied Hemingway for most of the postwar years. He remained based in Paris, but he traveled widely for the skiing, bullfighting, fishing, and hunting that by then had become part of his life and formed the background for much of his writing. His position as a master of short fiction had been advanced by Men Without Women in 1927 and thoroughly established with the stories in Winner Take Nothing in 1933. Among his finest stories are The Killers, The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber, and The Snows of Kilimanjaro. At least in the public view, however, the novel A Farewell to Arms (1929) overshadowed such works. Hemingways love of Spain and his passion for bullfighting resulted in Death in the Afternoon (1932), a learned study of a spectacle he saw more as tragic ceremony than as sport. Similarly, a safari he took in 193334 in the big-game region of Tanganyika resulted in The Green Hills of Africa (1935), an account of big-game hunting. Mostly for the fishing, he purchased a house in Key West, Florida, and bought his own fishing boat. A minor novel of 1937 called To Have and Have Not is about a Caribbean desperado and is set against a background of lower-class violence and upper-class decadence in Key West during the Great Depression.By now Spain was in the midst of civil war. Still deeply attached to that country, Hemingway made four trips there, once more a correspondent. He raised money for the Republicans in their struggle against the Nationalists under General Francisco Franco, and he wrote a play called The Fifth Column (1938), which is set in besieged Madrid. As in many of his books, the protagonist of the play is based on the author. Following his last visit to the Spanish war, he purchased Finca Viga (“Lookout Farm”), an unpretentious estate outside Havana, Cuba, and went to cover another warthe Japanese invasion of China.The harvest of Hemingways considerable experience of Spain in war and peace was the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940), a substantial and impressive work that some critics consider his finest novel, in preference to A Farewell to Arms. It was also the most successful of all his books as measured in sales. All of his life Hemingway was fascinated by warin A Farewell to Arms he focused on its pointlessness, in For Whom the Bell Tolls on the comradeship it createsand, as World War II progressed, he made his way to London as a journalist. He flew several missions with the Royal Air Force and crossed the English Channel with American troops on D-Day (June 6, 1944). Attaching himself to the 22nd Regiment of the 4th Infantry Division, he saw a good deal of action in Normandy and in the Battle of the Bulge. He also participated in the liberation of Paris, and, although ostensibly a journalist, he impressed professional soldiers not only as a man of courage in battle but also as a real expert in military matters, guerrilla activities, and intelligence collection.Following the war in Europe, Hemingway returned to his home in Cuba and began to work seriously again. He also traveled widely, and, on a trip to Africa, he was injured in a plane crash. Soon after (1953), he received the Pulitzer Prize in fiction for The Old Man and the Sea (1952), a short heroic novel about an old Cuban fisherman who, after an extended struggle, hooks and boats a giant marlin only to have it eaten by voracious sharks during the long voyage home. This book, which played a role in gaining for Hemingway the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954, was as enthusiastically praised as his previous novel, Across the River and into the Trees (1950), the story of a professional army officer who dies while on leave in Venice, had been damned.By 1960 Fidel Castros revolution had driven Hemingway from Cuba. He settled in Ketchum, Idaho, and tried to lead his life and do his work as before. For a while he succeeded, but, anxiety-ridden and depressed, he was twice hospitalized at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, where he received electroshock treatments. Two days after his return to the house in Ketchum, he took his life with a shotgun. Hemingway had married four times and fathered three sons.Hemingways fiction usually focuses on people living essential, dangerous lives, soldiers, fishermen, athletes, bullfighters, who meet the pain and difficulty of their existence with stoic courage. His celebrated literary style, influenced by Ezra Pound and Gertrude Stein , is direct, terse, and often monotonous, yet particularly suited to his elemental subject matter.B . About Story of “The Old Man and the Sea” For eighty-four days,an old Cuban fisher man named Santiago has had no luck .For eighty-four days,he has prepared his bait,lines,and boat and headed out to the big blue ocean,only to returen tired and empty-handed .Everything about him is old except his eyes, “Cheerful and Undefeated”,they are the same colour as the sea. While Santiago is preparing for his eighty-fifth attempt ,a young boy named Manolin brings him some food and helps him prepare his gear, Manolin used to fish with Santiago ,but has been forced by his parents to fish with instead with a “luckier” boat .His parents like everybody else,think it is only a waste of time to go fishing with the old man.However, the boy believes in Santiago, who taught him how to fish with all his rich knowledge of the sea. For Manolin, Santiago is like a father and teacher. The boy loves and respects the old man, and tells Santiago that he is the best fisherman.“Every day is a new day”, says Santiago. He tells the boy of his plan to end his bad luck. He will take his boat farther out ,where he believes the big fish lie waiting .They talk about the old mans hero, the great baseball player Joe DiMaggio, Santiago respects DiMaggio because he never give up despite physical pain.Santiago may be not as strong as he once was, but he still understands the sea. He has, above all, a strong will. That night, he dreams of a scene he remembers from his childhood: African lions playing on long white beaches.The next day, the boy obeys his parents and leaves to fish on another boat. All alone, Santiago sails far out to sea in his small boat. He prepares his lines, and drops them into the water .Around noon, something suddenly tugs at the line. He has hooked a hug marlin the biggest fish he has ever caught! However, he is unable to pull it in .The large fish keeps dragging Santiago farther out to sea.Santiago begins a three-day battle to catch the marlin. The fish is so strong that Santiago has to hold the fishing line tight to make sure it wont break. His hands bleed; his back aches. He feels lonely and wishes the boy were with him.Although hurt and tired, the old fisherman begin to admire the fish because he feels the fish, has a strong spirit that will never give up. The fish is like his brother instead of an enemy. Finally, he kills it with a harpoon and ends its pain.Unfortunately, sharks drawn by the fishs blood, soon come to the boat .They devour the marlin, leaving only the head, skeleton, and tail. However, Santiago is not sad. With dignity and grace, he says out loud, “A man can be destroyed but not defeated.” Santiago finally returns home and lays down in bed Manolin cries upon seeing him. They agree to fish together again .Unlike the boy sits by and watches him tenderly, the old man falls asleep. Again, he dreams of lions playing on the beach. II . Literature review of The Old Man and the SeaA. Hemingways Writing Style in This NovelIceberg principle:Whereas those novelists fashioned complex sentences to capture some of the most complex observations ever transcribed in English, Hemingway felt sure that he could do the same using concise everyday speech. He developed and prided himself on a philosophy of writing that he termed “the iceberg principle”. In a 1958 interview in The Paris Review, Hemingway described this style of writing in the following terms:I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There is seven-eighths of it underwater for every part that shows. Anything you know you can eliminate and it only strengthens your iceberg. It is the part that doesnt show. If a writer omits something because he does not know it then there is a hole in the story.Being distinguished from many greatest American writers, Hemingway is noted for his writing style. Among all his works, The Old Man and the Sea is a typical one to his unique writing style and technique. The language is simple and natural on the surface, but actually deliberate and artificial .Sometimes, the simple style is made a little different. The dialogue is combined with the realistic and artificial .The simplicity is highly suggestive, and often reflects the strong undercurrent of emotion. Occasionally, the author uses some figures of speech. Hemingways style is related to his experience as a journalist, his learning from many famous writers, and most importantly, his conscientious effort in looking for a style of his own. The influence of his style is great all over the world.The Old Man and the Sea is full of facts, most of which comes from Hemingways own experience .So the way to use facts is a very important writing technique in this novel .The facts in the novel are selected and used as a device to make the fictional world accepted .In the forepart of the novel , they are used to show the quality of Santiagos life, and are narrated simply and naturally: while in the latter part of the novel ,they are used from inside Santiagos own consciousness and form part of a whole scheme of the novel .Among many great American writers, Hemingway is a famous for his objective and terse prose style. As the last novel Hemingway published in his life, The Old Man and the Sea typically reflects his unique writing style. This part aims to discuss the writing style and techniques in The Old Man and the Sea. Of course , Hemingway has used many techniques in this novel ,such as realism, the creation of suspense , monologue, etc. And this part focuses especially on the language style and one of the important techniques-the way to use facts in this novel.Hemingway is famous for his language. With much care and effort ,he created a very influential and immediately recognizable style. Among all his works, The Old Man and the Sea is the most typical one to his unique language style. Its language is simple and natural , and has the effort of directness .This is because Hemingway always manages to choose words “ concrete, specific, more commonly found, casual and conversational.” He seldom uses adjective and abstract nouns, and avoids complicated syntax. Hemingways strength lies in his sentences and very specific details .His short sentences are powerfully loaded with tension, which he sees in life. Where he does not use a simple and short sentence, he connects the various parts of the sentence in a straightforward and sequential way, often linked by “and”.His sentences only give one small bit of the meaning. The rest is implied. One must go very deep beneath the surface to understand the full meaning for his writing. Certainly, there are moments when the reader feels the suggestion of vast meaning beneath Hemingways few, spare words. Santiagos beautiful and elusive memory of the lions playing on the beach suggests another world and another time, while his unexpected gratitude that man does not have to try to kill the stars signals a profound inner life of which the reader has only a mere glimpse. B. The Symbolism in This Novel In Ernest Hemingways masterpiece, The Old Man and the Sea, he uses much symbolism to assist the readers understanding of the massage he is trying to portray. The Old Man and the Sea isnt just a book about an old man and the sea. There are many hidden meanings to it. Each element represents different things.The novel is rich in symbolism that enhances both the plot and the Themes. The major symbol is the sea, which stands for all of life on which man must sail. In both the sea and in life, there are a number of possibilities that lie hidden from the common eye; some are gifts to be treasured and some are problems to be defeated. Neither will be found unless man embarks upon the journey. If man is lucky enough to discover a treasure (be it love or family or education), he must fight until death to retain it; if man is unlucky enough to discover an evil lurking underneath the surface of the sea (any one of lifes varied problems), he must fight it bravely and nobly until the end. In either case, it is the struggle that is all- important, and a man obtains the status of hero if he battles the sea (life) with grace under pressure. In the novel, Santiago embarks on a sea journey (life) and encounters a giant marlin (treasure). He battles nobly to earn the treasure and then fights the sharks (problems) to save it. The struggle defines him as a hero. Even though he loses the treasure (the marlin) to the sharks (the problems), he has won the sea battle (life).1. Santiago as SymbolTaken as a poetic symbol, Santiago the fisherman remains one of the most memorable creations of modern American literature. Old but silent, unlucky but not defeated, gentle but not soft, proud but boastful and perhaps most important hopeful for himself without being jealous of others. Santiago the fisherman is himself a poetry of the human spirit.In addition, Santiago tries his best to struggle in the novel. The struggle demonstrates fully what a man is and what he can endure. Santiago is provided with unlimited potentialities in face of danger. When he is fighting against the giant marlin, which is stronger than he, his potential is realized to the fullest extent. He chooses to battle until the end. Although he finally accepts the failure, he never gave up the strength to prove himself. For Santiago the outcome is less important than the struggle. As a result, it is not really important that he brings the fish home; the important thing is he struggled to win the battle. This fighting spirit elenates the old man to a symbol of the human kind. So from all of the above I think Santiago symbolizes all of mankind.Furthermore, Santiago also serves as a metaphor for its author-Hemingway himself. Hemingway is a creative writer. He is capable in his profession, and has proved. His talent several times before, but that is not sufficient. He has to prove it every day, for every day is a new day. Especially when he is unlucky and his literary creation is in difficulty, he needs to prove it even more. So he wishes to try a last fight once more and prove himself. The novel reflects Hemingways mind and situation at that time. Santiagos suffering is asking to his creation, which is never an easy task. His fighting spirit just reflects Hemingways attitude towards the difficulty in his literary creation. Here we can see the old man is also the incarnation of Hemingway himself.To conclude, Santiago is Hemingways ideal of manhood. He shows us not only how to live life heroically but in a way befitting a man. 2.Manolin as SymbolManolin, the young boy, that followed Santiago was not fishing with the old man because his parents forced him to, actually he was told to stay away form the old man because he was bad luck, bu