Customer Reviews

Old Man And The Sea (Scribner Classics)

5 star:		(389)
4 star:		(177)
3 star:		(100)
2 star:		(56)
1 star:		(66)

 

 

Aside from a few short stories, "The Old Man and the Sea" is the first Hemmingway book that I have read. Of course, I am familiar with his persona, and the idea of the "Hemmingway man," and was well aware as his stature as one of the greatest writers of modern times. But I had never read his books.

Wow. I mean, really. Wow. With "The Old Man and the Sea," it is so easy to see why Hemmingway was awarded the Nobel Prize, and why he deserves all of his accolades. This short novel is fierce, full of vibrant energy and humanity, all the while being a slave to the realities of finite power, of the inability to struggle against something greater than yourself. Of course, this is the standard "man against nature" story, but it is told with such craft that even cliches ring true.

Santiago is a fully-realized character. His strength of will is all that holds together his failing body. The great marlin that he struggles with is like a true fish, lacking personality or anthropomorphism, but just a powerful beast that does not want to die. There is no Moby Dick animosity, and the fish is under the water for the majority of the struggle. All of it, the sharks, the flying fish, the small boat and the ocean, each is what it is, lacking metaphor and saying that life itself is enough. No need to wax poetic.

I never knew a story a little over 120 pages could pack such a punch.

When Hemingway wrote THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA, he was no longer the writer he had been twenty years earlier. His talent was declining, he had over the past ten years written far more bad books than good ones, and was very much the worse for wear from the hard life he had lived. But somehow, he managed at this late stage in his life to produced one final masterpiece, and one of his very finest novels.

The story is one of Hemingway's simplest. All of his books are simple on the surface. THE SUN ALSO RISES is very simply told, but it contains a wealth of psychological and interpersonal complexity beneath the simple narrative. THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA is truly simple, a story about a simple man, with simple ideas, with a simple life, with a simple, elemental encounter with the natural world: he catches a massive marlin that he battles unsuccessfully to bring to market. It is a tale of success in the midst of failure, of quiet stoicism and courage, and refusing to give in to the challenges the world throws at him. Most of all, it is a story about courage.

The tale that is told is so clearly told that a very young child can understand it. It is so marvelously told that an adult can marvel over it. When my daughter was six, I read this to her, and he loved it (even developing a child's fascination with Joe DiMaggio).

Although the Nobel Prize is given to a writer for his or her work as a whole, and not just one book, it may well be that without this book Hemingway would not have won the Prize. His best work had appeared in the 1920s, and much of his work of the 1930s and virtually all of his work in the 1940s had been far, far below the quality of the early short stories, A FAREWELL TO ARMS, and THE SUN ALSO RISES. THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA was his great comeback, and it is quite likely that it was the book that made the difference in his being chosen as the recipient of the award.

I feel compelled to write a few words for Hemingway here after reading some of the negative reviews here. It seems that many of the people got bored of the book because there are no sucessive excitements throughout the story; and many just thought that this was merely one of the many books which has murmurred throughout on a boring theme---fishing.

But I think some of the commentators here have missed some important points. Firstly, Santiago is an Old Man as well as an experienced fisherman. It will be quite absurd to expect such an old experienced fisherman to become over-excited and hyper-sensitive because of some petty wounds or expected struggles with the fish. And as we all know one of the most important quality of a fisherman is to stay calm whether one has been waiting in idle for many hours or one is trying desperately to deal with a struggling fish. I think it is just unjust to expect Santiago to behave in a way that a younger college boy would do to make fun of himself and cheer up the audience in a Hollywood comedy. Anyway, you would not really expect to read some exaggerated sensational treatment of the theme by Hemingway, hear Santiago screaming because a few bloods came out of his slightly hurt right hand, or whine helplessly because the big fish was chopped off bit by bit by the sharks, would you?

Furthermore, some remarked that, despite whatever they have said negatively, they were still inspired by the theme, that if you persist on pursuing something, even if others think you are unlucky as well as incapable to achieve that, at the end of the day you will achieve that very goal. But in my opinion that is not the real inspiration of the story; the true inspiration comes from the dramatic plot towards the end that the big fish was eventually totally torn off and eaten by the sharks when Santiago finally came back to the shore. And I think this is where this story of Hemingway has distinguished itself from many of the other petty attempts by others to encapsulate the same theme. The message is that even if one has won something for a while, one may not be able to hold it for long and soon it will reduce to nothing. But one should not be discouraged by that. For the highest virtue and courage lies in doing something purely for something's sake instead of for its other rewards. Even if one fails to achieve something at the end, the very process that one has ever tried and persisted till the last minute alone is enough to justify one's effort. It is this 'attitude of a true man' that has driven us to build up what we refer to as the human civilization. And it is also this attitude that has embodied some of the most admirable elements of humanity.

The crying of the boy also showed that Santiago did not achieve nothing; at least he has inspired a boy, who was obviously much more 'valuable', if one wants to speak in this way, than the big fish. So, by changing one's perspective, one can see that Santiago's 87 days attempt was not futile at all; it has brought about a heart as passionate and courageous as his in his younger friend. Material treasures will not last, and it will have to go anyway when one moves his leg into the grave; But spiritual transformation can endure, and be spread from one to another and yet another, as through Hemingway's account of it, eternally from generation to generations to come.

This book is a triumph of the bare necessities. The old man goes far out to sea in a flimsy wooden boat, fishing with only a hook, line and bait. Alone, he manages to catch a thousand-pound, eighteen-foot marlin. A life and death struggle ensues as the old man works the fish for days trying to bring it in, but his struggle has only begun as he has to battle the sharks in order to keep his prize.

Like the old man in his story, Hemingway uses only the bare necessities. This is a textbook example of how to write a short story--not one wasted word. The conflict of man versus nature is a timeless one, but Hemingway's is a classic because he does so much with so little.

Could a story like this one be written today? And if it were, would any publishing house print it? What--no sex, no violence, no angry young men showing how tough they are by threatening and swearing at one another, no liberal idealists purveying an underlying political message, no sorcerers, magic or monsters. Where's the entertainment in that?

The beauty of The Old Man and the Sea is its pure and simple realism. No fluff, no filler material, no publisher's formula fiction, just a timeless classic told by a master of the short story.

I only started reading Hemingway last year, yet he's become one of my very favorite authors. In this book, "The old man and the sea", he writes about a lonely old Cuban fisherman, Santiago, that goes out fishing, desperate to catch a big fish. A fisherman's crusade for final glory.

Santiago, the fisherman, is poor and his only friend is a young boy. The young boy used to be his fishing-buddy, but as the luck left Santiago, the boy's father asked the boy to go out fishing in someone else's boat.

We enter the story as Santiago has gone 84 days fishing without catching any fish. On the 85th day, alone in the boat, he manages to hook a huge Marlin, the biggest he's ever seen. A fish that is much stronger than himself. Santiago's effort and suffering are brought to us in such a way only Hemingway could do. Hemingway uses such a simple language, yet one feels it as the richest ever. We follow Santiago's fight with the huge Merlin, and his return to town after days of fighting, catching the fish. What happens on his way home is just heartbreaking... He succeeds, but only to lose it in the end.

Hemingway writes in such a way that you feel the pain of the fisherman struggle yourself, and you can nothing do but to love the old fisherman. "The old man and the sea" is a moving story, of a man with great persistence, and with a message to never give up. Very highly recommended!

(If you like this book, I suggest you read Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men" too...)

The Old Man and The Sea is perhaps one of Ernest Hemingway's finest achievements. Here you will find the lean descriptive prose that made him one of the finest writer's of the twentieth century.

It tells the story of a fisherman who is down on his luck, but whose spirit is strong as the tropical winds that have tanned his skin and the sun that has made weak his eyes. He is devoted to the sea and knows all of its wildness and subtle moods. He goes out alone one day without his sidekick boy companion, because the boy's family has forbidden him to help his teacher for he has bad luck.

He hooks a Marlin, a huge mythical Marlin, the kind that fishermen only dream of catching. And the fish drags him out deeper and deeper into the ocean, farther than he's ever traveled. The battle is fierce and his hands are even bloodied as he ties himself to the rope and the fish in a struggle that is somehow symbolic of man's eternal quest to gain control over natural forces.

I would say more, however, Hemingway has done such a fine job that I suggest you read and read this wonderful tale. The ending is of course classic Hemingway. And it was for this book that Hemingway won the Nobel Prize for literature.

I am giving this book a 3 stars, but I consider this on the more "positive" side of the 3 then the negative. I believe that "The Old Man and The Sea" is not one of Hemingway's best works, however there are many aspects of this novel and themes covered that make this a significant novel. I teach this novel and find many students complaining about the lack of action. This book's main point, or moral, is the theme of struggling against the obstacles in life. What many do not realize is that much of the book is symbolic, with characters (Santiago, Manolin, the fish) representing allegorical figures of society. It might help to first look online for some reviews of this novel before plunging into the book if you are unsure about giving this novel a try. As usual, Hemingway uses simple structure in his narration. However, the book's structure is like this for a reason, and there are variable changes in structure and point of view as you read. The bottom line is that a reader might want to know a little about the symbolism and themes presented before beginning reading this novel.

I have, I think, read everything that Hemingway ever had published. As a youngster he was my favorite fiction writer and has remained so, although I have read a great many books in the interim, some by great writers.

Ernest Hemingway has had many detractors, but his writing speaks for itself. He needs no other champion.

Of all his stories, "The Old Man and the Sea" is perhaps his best. In it, an old Cuban fisherman, Santiago, fishing by himself, catches a giant, magnificent marlin, after a terrible struggle, and makes it fast to his small boat. On the way home, however, it is eaten by the sharks, leaving only a skeleton.

The story is, reputedly, autobiographical. The story itself is the great marlin, and the sharks are the critics, which have dogged Hemingway's declining career, panning such efforts as "Over the River and Into the Trees," and disparaging him generally as an aging has-been.

With "The Old Man and the Sea," Hemingway proved, to them and himself, that he could still write magnificent prose. For it he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature--a prize at which he had previously scoffed, saying that no one who had ever received it had subsequently written anything worthwhile.

Hemingway's literary style--his clipped, unadorned approach--has been often aped but never equaled. He was a true original, and most important; he was a sensitive observer of humanity and its follies. But, never an observer only; he was a participant. "The Snows of Kilimanjaro," if not autobiographical at least was based upon his own experience. He knew the people of whom he wrote. He had been a combatant and a journalist and a fisherman and a hunter: a man's man.

Like all really notable writers of fiction, he had lived his stories. I suggest that you read his work for yourself, and disregard the slurs of the effete intellectual snobs who slyly claim that he was a latent homosexual, and contrive to belittle his genius. They are like the sharks he portrayed, who would destroy the great prize of his legacy. Heed them not. In spite of his tragic death, he was a peerless writer.<P<

What an incredible story. I read this in less than two hours (it is a novella) and upon completing this simple story, I had a incredibly overwhelming satisfaction toward the ferocity of the human spirit. Yes, this book is all story but the main idea is all spirit. Those that can't see the incredible battle within are not READING the story, just the words. As a simple by-product, this book led directly to Ernest Hemingway's receipt of the Nobel Prize in 1954.

This story features three main characters: the old man (Santiago), a young boy (Manolin), and the human spirit. Santiago takes on the once-in-a-lifetime catch of a prize marlin which is described and portrayed in a manner to draw out the challenge facing each individual, both physically and emotionally. Santiago hasn't had a catch in 84 days. On day 85, he decides that, no matter what, he'll not return with a catch. Indeed, that was his fate. Santiago experiences physical pain, emotional pain, spiritual pain, and the pain of being alone with the elements. Yet, he continues on, creating hope where there is none. Before this story reaches it conclusion, getting right with life, Santiago decides it is he or the marlin.

This story is incredible. It deserves(d) all the critical acclaim received. Once again, those who didn't find this story touching their soul didn't read the story.

Having read and enjoyed most of Hemingway's major works, I recently decided to re-read this one. It was a wonderful decision.

"The Old Man and the Sea" excels at several levels. On the surface, it is a fine story about an old, down on his luck fisherman catching a huge marlin. But it also has deeper meanings including man against the elements, man fighting failure, man's relationship with nature etc. etc. It is also a story well and efficiently told. One of the great books of all time in only 120+ pages. It deserved the Pulitzer and all the other accolades it has received.