The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway
Advanced Placement Style Questions- worth two points each, number 13 is worth six
points. Due end of the block on ______
+____
30
Bio: Ernest Hemingway* (1899-1961), born in Oak Park, Illinois, started his career as a writer in a newspaper office
in Kansas City at the age of seventeen. After the United States entered the First World War, he joined a volunteer
ambulance unit in the Italian army. Serving at the front, he was wounded, was decorated by the Italian Government,
and spent considerable time in hospitals. After his return to the United States, he became a reporter for Canadian
and American newspapers and was soon sent back to Europe to cover such events as the Greek Revolution.
During the twenties, Hemingway became a member of the group of expatriate Americans in Paris, which he
described in his first important work, The Sun Also Rises (1926). Equally successful was A Farewell to Arms (1929),
the study of an American ambulance officer's disillusionment in the war and his role as a deserter. Hemingway used
his experiences as a reporter during the civil war in Spain as the background for his most ambitious novel, For Whom
the Bell Tolls (1940). Among his later works, the most outstanding is the short novel, The Old Man and the Sea
(1952), the story of an old fisherman's journey, his long and lonely struggle with a fish and the sea, and his victory in
defeat.
Hemingway - himself a great sportsman - liked to portray soldiers, hunters, bullfighters - tough, at times primitive
people whose courage and honesty are set against the brutal ways of modern society, and who in this confrontation
lose hope and faith. His straightforward prose, his spare dialogue, and his predilection for understatement are
particularly effective in his short stories, some of which are collected in Men Without Women (1927) and The Fifth
Column and the First Forty-Nine Stories (1938). Hemingway died in Idaho in 1961.
From Nobel Lectures, Literature 1901-1967, Editor Horst Frenz, Elsevier Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 1969
*Hemingway was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Letters for 1953 and the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954
Directions: After reading The Old Man and the Sea, answer the following questions citing
textual evidence (and page numbers!) to support your answer or opinion. Never merely answer
yes, no, or give one word answers. Remember that in literary analysis, there may be many
“right” answers; do your best to show insight and give evidence from the book in each response.
Characterization
1. Using textual support, characterize the old man, Santiago, as fully as possible.
2. Using textual support, characterize the boy, Manolin, as fully as possible.
3. How is he a dynamic character?
4. What is the nature of the relationship between the old man and the boy? Why does the
boy take care of him?
5. Why then does the old man talk aloud to himself? Analyze. What purpose does it serve?
Themes. *Reading and studying classic literature always requires a thorough analysis of
themes. Remember, a theme is an insight into life provided through a work of literature. Great
literature is great due to its ability to reveal a facet of the human condition to which we can all
relate.
Theme: Man’s Aspirations
6. Did the old man do well to pursue the great fish “far out [….] beyond all people in the
world”? Why or why not?
7. Why is he so unrelenting in this pursuit? (What do you think is Hemingway’s point?)
Symbolism
8. What do the lions that the old man dreams of symbolize?
9. Analyze how the following items function as symbols:
The sea
The fish
Allusions:
10. Analyze at least two of Hemingway’s allusions and explain why they work.
a.
b.
Novella as a whole:
11. Analyze the differences between a novella and a short story (research this).
12. Interpret The Old Man and the Sea as a parable (define the word “parable” first).
*http://www.cvsd.org/university/classes/eng/alentz/documents/The%20Old%20Man%20and%20
the%20Sea%20Questions.pdf
Major themes of the novella
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Man can be destroyed, but not defeated.
Pride and determination are the sources of greatness.
A worthy opponent brings out the best in a warrior.
Fortune plays a significant role in one’s life.
People should depend on themselves, not outside forces.
13. Choose one of the major themes of the novella and trace its development.