Ernest Hemingway Fish

The simple fishing story told in The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway represents Hemingway’s life and writing success through the character portrayed in the book. Santiago’s desire to achieve his goals of catching a great fish and superior recognition in the fishing community is exactly like the author who wants the same in his field. Hemingway communicates his inner struggle as a writer and his perceptions of the world through the simplicity of this fishing story. He achieves this via Santiago’s actions and characteristics, descriptions of the animals who affect Santiago’s fishing success, and the public’s view of the great fish. Santiago’s mindset and characteristics correlate with Hemingway’s decisions as a writer and makes sense …show more content…
He describes the first shark who takes parts of meat away, “He was a very big Mako Shark built to swim as fast as the fastest fish in the sea and everything about him was beautiful except his jaws...he swam fast, just under the surface with his high dorsal fin knifing through the water without wavering...This was a fish built to feed on all other fishes in the sea, that were so fast and strong and well armed that they had no other enemy”(101). A skilled critic of literature does the same thing as this shark through their critiques and can penetrate a seemingly flawless book and has a deep enough knowledge of writing that he or she would be able to see the true mistakes and pick apart the bad pieces and leave the best behind. This shark actually represents a critic and attacks the fish, but does not eat the best parts of it, instead eating what is bad. Contrary to this shark, the next sharks just want to eat, “[the second sharks] had the scent and were excited and in the stupidity of their great hunger they were losing and finding the scent in their excitement… They were hateful sharks, bad smelling, scavengers as well as killers, and when they were hungry they would bite at an oar or the rudder of a boat...they would hit a man in the water, if they were hungry, even if the man had no smell of blood nor of fish slime on him”(107-108). The …show more content…
Only one person in the public understands the true story of the fish and the undertaking Santiago must have assumed, “‘What’s that?’ she asked a waiter and pointed to the long backbone of the great fish that was now just garbage waiting to go out with tide. ‘Tiburon,’ the waiter said. ‘Eshark.’ He was meaning to explain what happened”(126-127). The waiter understands what the meat of the fish was before and sees past the simple bones and structure of the fish, understanding the struggles Santiago went through to catch the fish. Just like the waiter, few readers can read past the surface story and comprehend the idea of the whole story being an allegory, but the readers who do cannot always explain it. But, the rest of the public just see the bones of the fish, “‘I didn’t know sharks had such handsome, beautifully formed tails.’ ‘I didn’t either,’ her male companion said.”(127). The tourists on the dock see what is there, what is in front of them, and do not understand the struggle of catching a fish that enormous nor recognize how beautiful the fish must have been. Much like the tourists in the book, most readers see the eloquence in his writing and the ability to make a simple story interesting, but don’t understand the true significance and the allegory of the book. The two types of people described in the