Conflict of The Old Man and the Sea

In the book, 'The Old Man and the Sea' the old man has to deal with many conflicts. He has to deal with the young boy not being with him anymore, he has to deal with his own unluckiness for eighty four days and then when he finally caught a fish, he couldn't even lift it into his boat. Despite all these problems, the old man remained optimistic.

I think the main conflict of this book happens when the old man catches the big fish. He gets all excited that he finally got his big catch, but it turned out that the fish was so big and the old man was so weak, that he could not lift the fish into the boat.

When the old man first caught the fish, he was afraid that if he tried to pull it in, the line would break and the fish would escape. He had worked so hard that he could not take any chances of losing the fish. The fish continued dragging on the line and he drags the old man and his boat out away from the lang farther and farther. The old man is worried that the fish will keep going deeper down into the water, making it more difficult to drag him into the boat. The fish pulled the boat all night, and the next day, the fish was still pulling. At one point, the fish pulled sharply on the line, which cut into the old man's hands. This cut made it even more difficult for the old man to hold onto the line.

The old man began to lose his strength while holding onto the line, and he decides that he needs to eat something. He cut up the fish that he caught the day before with his uncut hand. He was holding the line only with his cut hand, when it cramped up turning into a claw. This frustrates the old man very much because he knows that he needs his hand to catch this fish.

Finally, the old man's luck begins to turn when the fish jumps out of the water. This is good news for the old man because it means that the fish's air sacs are filled with air, preventing it from going too deep into the water.

The conflict of the story worsens when the fish jumps out of the water for a second time. The old mans hands become more and more badly cut and he falls face first into the meat of a dolphin that he had caught. He fears that the smell of the dolphin meat will make him nauseous and cause him to lose his strength.

Later that day, the fish started to circle the boat, getting closer and closer with each circle. Eventually the fish is close enough and the old man killed it with a harpoon. He tried to lift the fish into the boat, but it was too large and too heavy. The old man quickly tried to return home, but the fish drag him very far away from the land. The trip home is very long and the fish is bleeding into the water, attracting sharks. When the first shark appeared, the old man was ready. The shark got a bite of the fish, but the old man killed it before it could get a second bite. He lost his harpoon in the battle with the shark. The bite from the shark made more blood spill out from the fish, attracting more sharks. The sharks eat most of the fish and by the time the old man returned, all that was left of the fish was the skeleton.

The main conflict of the story was all the events that prevented the old man from returning home with his awesome catch. These events were very frustrating for the old man and they could have probably been avoided if he had the boy with him.

Hemingway, Ernest. The Old Man and the Sea. New York: Scribner Paperback Fiction, 1995. Print.

Perspective, The Old Man and the Sea

The book 'The Old Man and the Sea' is written in a third person perspective. This perspective is one where the story is told by an outside narrator. By using a third person point of view to write this book, the author, Ernest Hemingway, is able to show us what all the characters are feeling. The third person perspective does not limit the story to being told by just one of the characters like other perspectives do. Ernest Hemingway uses this point of view to help readers understand the story better. It helps us understand how the old man was feeling when he had finally caught his fish. It helped us understand his frustration when he couldn't lift the fish into the boat because he was alone and he wasn't strong enough to do it without the boy there. This point of view did not limit us to only knowing the old mans thoughts, though. It also helped us to see how the boy felt when he was no longer allowed to go out and fish with the old man. His family forbid him from fishing with the old man because they believed he was unlucky. The boy did not want to stop fishing with the old man, because he wanted to continue helping him and learning from him. The boy felt very bad about leaving the old man, but the old man was understanding about the situation. The author's use of third person point of view was helpful in this part of the book because it showed us how both characters were feeling.

I think that the author made a good choice for the perspective of this book, because with the third person perspective, the reader is not influenced by one character. Instead they read the story from an unbiased point of view. The narrator of the story helped me to better understand the character's thoughts and feelings of the situation and also gave me a better understanding of the story.

Hemingway, Ernest. The Old Man and the Sea. New York: Scribner Paperback Fiction, 1995. Print.

Author's values, The Old Man and the Sea

In the book 'The Old Man and the Sea', the author reveals his values through some of the main characters in the book. He portrayed the old man as patient, kind, hard working and optimistic. There are many times in the book where the old man shows these qualities, which reveals that the author thinks that these qualities are very important to him. The old man shows patience when he is fishing. He went out to sea for eighty four days in a row without catching a single fish. He was very persistent and never gave up. He always believed that his big catch would come the next day, showing a lot of patience (Hemingway 9).

Another characteristic that the author shows he values is kindness. He shows this through the old man when the boy leaves him. After forty days of going out to sea with the old man without a single catch, the boys family decides that the old man is officially "salao", meaning that he is the worst form of unlucky. The young boys family forces him to go to a more lucky ship. The old man shows kindness in this situation because he does not become upset with the boy at all. He is very understanding of the situation (Hemingway 9).

A third characteristic that the old man portrays in this book is that he is very hardworking. He wakes up every morning very early to go out to sea and fish. Every morning he had to do hard work to prepare his boat for the day. He doesn't complain about it, and he always stayed positive even when he had no success.

The last characteristic that the author values is optimism. He showed this in the way that the old man would never give up hope. After going out to sea for eighty four days with out success, the old man never lost hope. Every one he knew had lost faith in him and was calling him unlucky, but he did not let it get to him. He always ignored them and stayed focus. After a day with no luck, he would tell himself that tomorrow would be the day. He kept going out everyday with a good attitude.

In 'The Old Man and the Sea' the author makes the old man a role model of the young boy. I think by doing this he is showing that the old man is someone who should be looked up to and that the values and traits of the old man are some that the author also values.

Hemingway, Ernest. The Old Man and the Sea. New York: Scribner Paperback Fiction, 1995. Print.