The Old Man ad the Sea -
The
Old Man and the Sea is the story of a battle between an old, experienced
fisherman and a large marlin. The novel opens with the explanation that the
fisherman, who is named Santiago, has gone 84 days without catching a fish.
Santiago is considered "salao", the worst form of unluckiness. In
fact, he is so unlucky that his young apprentice, Manolin, has been forbidden
by his parents to sail with the old man and been ordered to fish with more
successful fishermen. Still dedicated to the old man, however, the boy visits
Santiago's shack each night, hauling back his fishing gear, getting him food
and discussing American baseball and his favorite player Joe DiMaggio. Santiago
tells Manolin that on the next day, he will venture far out into the Gulf
Stream, north of Cuba in the Straits of Florida to fish, confident that his
unlucky streak is near its end. Thus on the eighty-fifth day, Santiago sets out
alone, taking his skiff far onto the Gulf Stream. He sets his lines and, by noon
of the first day, a big fish that he is sure is a marlin takes his bait. Unable
to pull in the great marlin, Santiago instead finds the fish pulling his skiff.
Two
days and two nights pass in this manner, during which the old man bears the
tension of the line with his body. Though he is wounded by the struggle and in
pain, Santiago expresses a compassionate appreciation for his adversary, often
referring to him as a brother. He also determines that because of the fish's
great dignity, no one will be worthy of eating the marlin. On the third day of
the ordeal, the fish begins to circle the skiff, indicating his tiredness to
the old man. Santiago, now completely worn out and almost in delirium, uses all
the strength he has left in him to pull the fish onto its side and stab the
marlin with a harpoon, ending the long battle between the old man and the
tenacious fish. Santiago straps the marlin to the side of his skiff and heads
home, thinking about the high price the fish will bring him at the market and how
many people he will feed.
While
Santiago continues his journey back to the shore, sharks are attracted to the
trail of blood left by the marlin in the water. The first, a great mako shark,
Santiago kills with his harpoon, losing that weapon in the process. He makes a
new harpoon by strapping his knife to the end of an oar to help ward off the
next line of sharks; in total, five sharks are slain and many others are driven
away. But the sharks keep coming, and by nightfall the sharks have almost
devoured the marlin's entire carcass, leaving a skeleton consisting mostly of
its backbone, its tail and its head. Finally reaching the shore before dawn on
the next day, Santiago struggles on the way to his shack, carrying the heavy
mast on his shoulder. Once home, he slumps onto his bed and falls into a deep
sleep. A group of fishermen gather the next day around the boat where the
fish's skeleton is still attached. One of the fishermen measures it to be 18
feet (5.5 m) from nose to tail. Tourists at the nearby café mistakenly take it
for a shark. Manolin, worried during the old man's endeavor, cries upon finding
him safe asleep. The boy brings him newspapers and coffee. When the old man
wakes, they promise to fish together once again. Upon his return to sleep, Santiago
dreams of his youth—of lions on an African beach.
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