The story takes place around 1940/1950 in a fishing-village on Cuba and on the sea around the island. You can tell the story takes place around that time because the old man and a boy talk about baseball and how “The great DiMaggio” is going to make the New York Yankees win, “he makes the difference”. DiMaggio was a famous baseball player who played for the New York Yankees between 1936 and 1951. You can also tell that the story takes place in that period because new technology like televisions and computers don’t occur in the book, the radio is still very popular. You know the man lives on Cuba, because he fishes in the Gulf Stream “who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream” and when the old man was sailing back he talked about “a long island” and how he could never miss it.
Main characters
The main character is an old fisherman whose name is Santiago. The old man was thin with on his hands scars of all the times he cut himself, when he had a big fish on his cords and on his head brown spots of benevolent skin cancer he got from the sun. “The brown blotches of the benevolent skin cancer the sun brings from its reflection on the …show more content…
That’s the reason the book is called: The old man and the sea.
Genre
This work is a bit a psychological story, because you really get to know what the old man thinks and how it is for him to fight with such a big, strong fish for more than 2 days.
Opinion
I really liked the book. It shows well how the man copes with his setbacks every time. He never gives up and I admire that. The story also describes the sea and all the creatures in it in a beautiful way. Furthermore the tension of the book makes you want to read it in one go. This tension alternated with the beautiful descriptions of the sea and the memories of the man, makes it a good book to read. That’s the reason I recommend this book to