The Old Man and the Sea - Discussion Question 5

Ernest Hemmingway wrote the novella The Old Man and the Sea in the year 1952. During this time period, baseball was becoming America’s favorite pastime. Around the same time The Old Man and the Sea was published, television was becoming a must-have in the homes of thousands of families everywhere; and what sport did the families tune into habitually? Yes, baseball. Joe DiMaggio is mentioned a number of times throughout the book. Santiago looks up to DiMaggio and gives high regard to the baseball celebrity. It is clear that Mr. DiMaggio was a very influential person in this time period because of the respect the wise, old man has for him. Santiago continually tells himself if the “Great DiMaggio” can do it, so can he. “Do you believe the great DiMaggio would stay with a fish as long as I will stay with this one? he thought,” (Hemmingway 68). In this quote, Santiago questions if DiMaggio would be as dedicated to the marlin as he is himself. I believe Hemmingway’s countless reference to Joe DiMaggio exquisitely represents the time period of the novella because of the importance baseball had at the time.

In 1952, nobody made a living by selling Apple products all over the world. There were no “quick money” scandals to drawn in the hard-working citizens of the time period. Back then, people worked hard for their money. It is like the saying goes, “working hard, or hardly working”. In 1952, if you yearned for money, you put the effort into making a dollar. In society today, multi-million dollar business owners sit back and boss people around, and that is how they earn their cash. The behavior and social issues in the novella revolve around a popular career for many individuals who resided near a body of water. For men like Santiago and the fishermen mentioned in the beginning of the story who mocked the old man for his bad luck, fishing was their way of supporting themselves and their family.

An overall symbolic and thematic significance in the book is hard work pays off. The old man symbolizes what hard work can really do for a person. He dedicated himself to the task of bringing the marlin back to land in one piece. In the end he fails to bring the marlin back to his shack, but came out of the situation knowing he worked hard at the task he set out to do. Santiago’s “prize” is knowing he was able to catch the biggest fish of his career and end his eighty-four days without a catch. Although he was not able to bring it back to show the other fishermen, he was able to prove to himself that he still had his skill and wisdom in fishing.

Hemingway, Ernest. The Old Man and the Sea. New York: Scribner, 2003. Print.