Published in 1952, The Old Man and the Sea, a slim novella, earned Earnest Hemingway the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. A story of struggle and man’s eternal hope, wrapped into the tale of one old fisherman, Santiago and his desperation to sustain his livelihood, the story, simple at a glance, is a tale of heroism. In Bob Corbett’s words ” The Old Man and the Sea is a magnificent story. At one level it is the tale of a man and a fish, at another, a story of man versus nature, at yet another, the story of the culture of manhood, courage, bravery in the face of existence, and at yet another a history of what life was like when individuals were more the central actors on the human stage and not groups or organizations.”

A deeper delve into the psyche of the plot lights the theme of celebration of bravery, courage and final triumph of man. Set in the fishing village near Florida, portraying the life of an old Cuban fisherman, the seemingly foreign elements of fishing and being dragged out to sea by a sword fish but still not giving up the rope of hope, comes together in the utter brilliance of Hemingway’s use of language. The recurrent theme of man versus nature is sprung on the reader on every page of the novella. From an unlikely friendship to the fictional pot of yellow rice and cast net, the struggle of man in the face of direct confrontation with nature made existence vulnerable and at times, desperate.

Earnest Hemingway’s picturesque language transports the reader to the seashore and far out beyond the shore with the fish. The classic that was an enriching and bewitching read, I give 4 stars out of 5.