Point Of View In Ernest Hemingway's A Clean, Well-Lighted Place

Writers use point of view to create a certain feeling for their readers. They can use any of the four points of view to either capture their reader’s attention or to make the ending of their story more of a surprise to the readers. In Ernest Hemingway’s A Clean, Well-Lighted Place, there is an old man and two waiters, a younger and older waiter, in a cafe. The old man is deaf, so when the old man wants to drink more brandy, the young waiter kicks him out and the older waiter questions him about it. Later on the older waiter goes to a bar. Hemingway chose to write this short story in third person limited omniscient, which is important because it doesn’t give a lot of information that would give away the ending, it doesn’t tell us all of what …show more content…
The story is about an old man who drinks brandy at a clean cafe instead of drinking at a bar. Once the younger waiter and the older waiter closed the cafe up, the older waiter went to a bar to drink. On his way there he kept a conversation with himself. The older waiter says that “it is the light of course but it is necessary that the place be clean and pleasant” (Hemingway 159). This could be referring to a place such as a hospital or Heaven. Hospitals are always clean so that none of their patients get illnesses from going there. Hospitals also usually have a lot of light which makes it seem like a pleasant or good place to be. Heaven can be the same way. When most people think of Heaven, they think of brightness and how clean and pure the people would be in Heaven. The older waiter eventually goes to a bar and asks for a drink. He then comments on how bright it is in the bar but it is unclean. The bartender calls the older waiter crazy. This part of the book shows how the older waiter relates to the old man. Hemingway probably wrote this short story in third person limited omniscient so that he wouldn’t show how the story ended to the