The old man and the sea – Ernest Hemingway – Review

It looks like Ernest Hemingway has an inclination towards anti-climax stories, something that can leave the reader with a heavy heart.  I was wondering what’s the message in the end, isn’t it not a futile exercise to be beaten down every time despite the hard attempt?

An old man skilled in deep sea fishing, has been running on dry luck for over 80 days. His neighbouring fishermen are able to get good catches every few days but the old man’s dry days in the sea looked never ending. As being the case, he becomes a ridicule amongst the fishermen community and gets labelled as someone who will never be able to catch any fish.

However, the old man keeps his hope intact and ventures into the deep sea for his next attempt. On this attempt, he happens to catch the longest sword fish ever to have caught in his community, measuring eighteen feet in length. The fish keeps him in deep sea for 3 days and 2 nights, emerging to the surface a few times to display it’s enormity and size up the opponent. From the time of catch to the point of getting himself offshore, the old man gets his physical and mental attributes tested to the maximum capacity. Despite the hard nature of the test, the old man keeps finding ways to beat the challenges that comes along his way.

In the end, the challenges gets the better of him and he ends up losing his prized catch for the school of sharks that chased him and wrenched the meat of the fish on the way back. As he reached the shore, only the bones of the eighteen feet fish was left over but the entire community is surprised at such a massive catch.

Completely bruised by a life threatening failed attempt, the old man lets the defeat sink in. But never the one to lose hope, the old man gets his health recovered and ushers himself up for his next hunt, learning the lesson from his hard test but keeping his sprints high as always.

It would be a perfect book to read during a train journey.