Follow us. Critical insights: The Old Man and the Sea, much like the novella it reflects upon, is a study on the human condition: luck, success, aging and loss. In the introductory essay which is followed by a brief but thorough biography of Ernest Hemingway by the editor, Robert C. The old man is trying to grapple with his existential condition and has apprehension about how to do so. Ewing observed the rise in the average age level of the United States.
In relation to this emerging public interest in age, the novella would have afforded several planes of reflection to take different age-roles into account. The proposition would be a challenge by example: the enduring strength in the face of the loss of time. Sure, the sharks would come, but not before the glory.
Aging and the passage of time is inevitable. Glory, on the other hand, is elusive, and takes a mixture of circumstances and elements. Luck and chance, whether the belief in it is shared or not, will play a role in this process. Even though he does break the streak, catching the great fish, the game of chance is not over. The sharks would smell the blood and ultimately come. The seemingly opposite forces sometime act as one, both in life and literature. This, in itself, embodies the Tao.
It is older than God. The cyclical nature of the universe with its opposing forces can also be read in the final loss of the fish to the sharks, the very essence of the dichotomic forces at play. Essays in this vein include Matthew M. This is a probable allusion to Santiago de Compostela, the Spanish title for St. James the Apostol, a theme which is expanded in the essay.
How fishing has been used to link religion and literature also plays an important part in the collection: if religion is not limited to metaphysical devotion to superior beings, it may also be a devoted action and an act of devotion with all its rites, ceremonies, and emotions that lead a person toward the transcendental. His devotion to the art of fishing was harnessed from an early age, in which he would fly-fish the streams of Michigan. After all, it is a fight to the death, in which pain and sacrifice are no strangers.
