Play Book Tag discussion

Santiago is an old fisherman who hasn’t caught anything in nearly three months, but he is not discouraged and keeps trying. On that day he goes out and hooks a huge fish whom he talks to and follows for two days, before finally killing him. Then he has to bring him back and there are sharks.

That’s it. That’s the book.

And it was oddly fascinating for 80 pages of an old man alone talking to a fish.

Also I must say I don’t condone violence against animals, but Santiago does what he gotta do I suppose.

If it makes you feel any better about the violence, this novel is an allegory. I didn't notice it when I was a young teen and read it all in one go, but it was blatantly obvious the second time I read it. I looked it up and it is certainly treated that way. I am not sure if that was Hemingway's intent, but I highly doubt he would have been unaware of how it came across. I did not major in English and know little about Hemingway, just snippets, and I already know I don't want to delve too deeply into him because I want to read his fiction before I know too much more about him.

Elise wrote: "Santiago is an old fisherman who hasn’t caught anything in nearly three months, but he is not discouraged and keeps trying. On that day he goes out and hooks a huge fish whom he talks to and follow..."

I also didn't realise the first time I read it but I saw it mentioned somewhere so went back and read it again. It was obvious when I knew but I'm still not sure it would have occurred to me otherwise!