The 老人Old Man and the Sea was written by an American writer named Ernest Hemingway. It has been translated into tens of languages, and the writer was so proud of his work.
Santiago, the hero of the story, had gone eighty-four days without taking a fish back. At first, a boy named Manolion had been with him, but Santiago couldn’t catch even one fish. The boy had gone at his parents’ orders in a lucky boat which caught three good fish the first week, and the couple thought that it was definitely and finally bad to let their boy stay with the old fisherman. On Santiago’s eighty-fifth day of fishing, he went out alone, leaving the smell of the land behind and rowing out into the clean early morning smell of ocean. To his surprise, he caught a tuna which he had never seen before and it was hard to believe that the tuna was bigger than his boat. Later, the blood from the tuna left a trail for all sharks as wide as a highway, so fighting against sharks was unavoidable. The result was that sharks ate up all the meat of the tuna and Santiago only brought the tuna skeleton back. He was so tired that he slept deeply as soon as he got home, dreaming of lions.
In this story, Santiago was an old and poor widow though he was good at fishing and had so much valuable experience. He only lived on fishing all his life. At long last, he just brought the skeleton back, you may think such a fisherman should be a loser, but this result didn’t mean failing. On the contrary, Hemingway used the skeleton which was the pillar of spirit to strengthen the meaning of the old man’s life. Santiago was described as a perfect person who never gave up.
The boy named Manolion appeared in the beginning and at the end. Even during Santiago’s voyage, he always came to the poor old man’s mind. He was the only person who cared Santiago sincerely, trust Santiago absolutely, and the young boy wanted to be an inheritor of Santiago’s career. Hemingway not only told us the experience of fishing should be spread from generation to generation, but also expected us to admire, to learn from and to carry on the spirit of Santiago. The appearance of Manilion was not by chance, which was arranged by Hemingway. During Santiago’s long voyage, how much he wished the boy could have been with him to drive his loneliness away. Youth is the symbol of energy and hope. Even an old man can be young inside. Lions appeared several times in Santiago’s dreams for they were living in his heart, which showed the spirit of Santiago would never be low.
The coming of the sharks could not be avoided. They can be thought as attack which can swallow your success and happiness. The story tells me to face the problems happened in my life with a heart as wide as ocean. Though the old man was lonely, he was a traveler who walked on the road of realizing his ideals. But he was not alone at the moment, for his will was so firm. The Old Man and the Sea has won the Nobel Prize at last, which is a comfort to the writer.
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