I Love English

Well I just did my English homework... and I thought I'd type it up here for future reference... haha



1. Q. Hemingway might have written The Old Man and the Sea as a longer novel, taking Santiago from his early childhood to his final dreams of the lions. What would have been lost if he had done this? What gained?



A. If Hemingway wrote a longer novel for The Old Man and the Sea, I think that he would’ve lost the significance of how little words mean so much. He would’ve lost the powerful effect that he had on the reader. The great thing about this short story is that Hemingway says so much, that you could go on about the whole book, in minimal words. Though he would’ve lost that, he would’ve gained more time to explain and help the reader see the pictures that he intended to write. Hemingway would have more space to mold the picture of the scene into the readers head and maybe help to get all of the symbolism recognized.


2. Q. In much of this book the old man is talking to himself. Is this heavy reliance on the introspective monologue a weakness or a strength? Explain your answer. Would this technique be a weakness or a strength in making a film of the book? Why or why not?

A. I believe that the continuous monologue in The Old Man and the Sea is a strength. It helps the reader be creative; they can picture this old man and what he’s thinking. With a dialog, you’re not always sure what both of the characters are thinking. I also think that this technique would be a strength in a film of the book because it would show a reflection of the book itself. It would help to complete the reader’s imagination of the scenes. It’s a unique way of telling a story. You get to see both sides of the old man. One side encouraging himself and the other side telling him his own flaws.


3. Q. Why, where, and how effectively does Hemingway make use of the film making technique? Analyze several specific flashbacks.



A. Hemingway uses flashbacks to help relate the moment to the old man at a given time. One example of this is when the old man was discouraging himself about his cramped up hand. He’s was explaining and reminding himself of how strong he was when he was younger. His flashback took place in a tavern at Casablanca, “Each one was trying to force the other’s hand down onto the table… They changed the referees every four hours… Blood came out from under the fingernails of both his and the negro’s hands and they looked each other in the eye… The walls were painted bright blue and were of wood and the lamps threw their shadows against them. The negro’s shadow was huge and it moved on the wall as the breeze moved the lamps.” (Pg. 69) The old man seems to remember exactly how the room looked, and that shows how well he remembered the moment and how much that time meant to him.



4. Q. As Hemingway has built his book, does it end with a climax, an anti-climax, both, or neither? Explain your answer.


A. I don’t think that the ending of Hemingway’s book was either a climax or an anti-climax। I think that the way he concluded The Old Man and the Sea was a way to keep people from getting bored, but I don’t think that it was a climax. It showed the way how people can be in such poverty on one side of a wall, and on the other side, people can live in such luxury. And I believe that he meant the reader to see that not all stories were meant to be told. The woman who had no idea about the old man and what he went through with the big fish, and all she saw was the skeleton. No one was there to put a story behind it and to her it was just garbage in a garbage dump.


~Alex

P.S. no. picture.