The Old Man and The Sea A short novel by a great author named Ernest Hemmingway, The Old Man And The Sea, is the book I read. It was published in 1952. This book is "nearly faultless" as Malcolm Cowley of the New York Herald Tribune said. Other critics described it as a masterpiece, one of his best writings. In 1953, this short novel won the Pulitzer Prize. The year after that it won the Nobel Prize. The Old Man And The Sea is set in the mid-twentieth century in Cuba and the Gulf Stream. The gulf stream being where the old man was beaten and Cuba his home. The characters in this novel are Santiago, the old Cuban fisherman; Manolin, a young boy and Santiago's closest frie ...view middle of the document...
The bird circles again and again and the old man sees a tuna which he hauls onto the skiff. Toward noon, a marlin starts nibbling on the line. The old man knew it is a big fish so he did not let go even when the fish is dragging him further out to sea. The fish injures Santiago: cut his cheek and hand and cramps his hand, but he did not let go. Finally, the fish starts to circle the skiff and when it circles close to the skiff the old man harpoons it and then lashes the marlin to the bow and stern. An hour later he sights the first shark. It is a fierce Mako, and it comes in fast to slash with raking teeth at the dead marlin. With failing might, the old man strikes the shark with his harpoon. The Mako rolls and sinks, carrying the harpoon with it and leaving the marlin mutilated and bloody. Santiago knew the scent would spread. Serveying, he sees two shovel-nosed sharks closing in. He strikes at one with his knife lashed to the end of an oar and watches the scavenger sliding down into the deep water. The other he kills while he tears at the flesh of the marlin. When the third appears, he stabs at it with the knife, only to feel the blade to snap as the fish rolls. The other shark came at sunset. At first he tries to club them with the tiller from the skiff, but his hands are cut up and bleeding and there are too many in the pack. In the darkness, as he steers toward the faint glow of Havana, he hears them hitting the carcass again and again. His great tiredness and steering are all he thinks about. He knows they would leave him nothing but the bare skeleton of his great catch. All lights are out when he sails into the harbor. In the gloom, he could just make out the white backbone and the upstanding tail of the fish. He starts up the shore with the mast and sail of his bo...
