"The Old Man and the Sea" by Ernest Hemingway

Hello and welcome. You're listening to novel conversations, a program about the world's greatest stories. I'm your host Frank LeVallo, and each week on novel conversations I talk to two readers about one novel, and together we summarize the story for you. We'll introduce you to the characters, tell you what happens to them, and we read from the book along the way. And at the end of the show I talk to our researcher Ted Schwartz on our end note segment. Ted always has something interesting to tell us about the book and the author. So if you love hearing a good story, you're in the right place. This week I'm going to have a conversation about the novel, The Old Man in the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway. And I'll be joined in conversation by our novel conversations readers, Ildy and Scott Rich. Ildy, Scott, welcome. Great to be here. Thanks so much. You're welcome. Before we get started, let me read you a brief introduction of our novel today, The Old Man in the Sea. Published in 1952 and set in Cuba during the early 1950s, The Old Man in the Sea is a story of an epic struggle between Santiago and old seasoned Cuban fisherman and the greatest catch of his life. After 84 days of catching no fish, Santiago finally lands the biggest fish he's ever caught. How Santiago manages to bring that big catch home while surviving struggles with sharks, the sea, and his own physical limitations make up the story of Hemingway's The Old Man in the Sea. Ildy, let me start with you. Is this the first time you read The Old Man in the Sea? It is the first time, although I have seen the movie. What was your reaction to the book? The book was deceptively simple and yet very complex at the same time when you dig down deep. Many layers, is that what you would say? Like an onion. Scott, how about you? Was this the first time reading The Old Man in the Sea? No, the first time I read The Old Man in the Sea, I was going into the fourth grade. And as soon as I finished it, I read it again. I've loved it ever since. Do you recall your reaction to it when you were in fourth grade versus your reaction to it today? Back then, I wanted to do nothing but go fishing. Now, it's more of a contemplation on what it means to be an accomplished Old Man. So in other words, when you were in fourth grade, you saw yourself as Manel in the Little Boy and now you're seeing yourself, if not quite the Old Man, an older man? I guess you could look at it that way. I hadn't thought of it that way myself. I see who's an Old Man. I'm not going there. Although I think Scott was born about 74 years old. That's what my father says. So Scott, if this novel made you want to go fishing when you were in fourth grade, what's it make you want to do now? Be stubborn, determined, and never given. And live forever like our Old Man? I think he sees his mortality. Like the fish's mortality. All right. Scott, tell me a little bit about Santiago and how we meet him. We are on the shores of Cuba, a small fishing village, which has a little more than a market of bar and a host of fishermen. We learn quickly about an Old Man who has had an intense round of bad luck. He's gone 84 days without catching a fish. In fact, at 40 days, he's considered so unlucky that his fishing companion, a young boy who is basically an apprentice, is taken away from him. It'll detail us a little bit about the young boy. His name is Manelin. Manelin has been fishing with Santiago since he was about five years old. And how old is he now, do you figure? I think he's probably about 12. When Santiago has such bad luck, Manelin's father forbids him from fishing with him anymore. But this isn't his worst bout of bad luck fishing, right? He refers us to a time when he went 87 days without a catch. Manelin says, "This is nothing you went 87 days without fish, and then we caught big ones every day for three weeks." Scott, there's a great little exchange between Manelin and Santiago where they sort of tell a little lies to each other. And I think that really shows us the depth of the relationship between the young boy and the Old Man. Yes, it's at the end of the day. The young boy always meets the Old Man. He meets him when he comes in with a skiff and helps him carry his things up to the shack. And Manelin asks Santiago, "What do you have to eat? A pot of yellow rice with fish. Do you want some?" The young boy says, "No, I only did home. Do you want me to make the fire?" "No, I will make it later on." Or I may eat the rice cold. May I take the casnette? Of course. There was no casnette, and the boy remembered when he had sold it. But they went through this fiction every day. There was no pot of yellow rice and fish, and the boy knew this too. But it'll be. It's not just lies that they tell each other. They talk about a lot more, especially baseball. It seems that their favorite pastime is talking about America's favorite pastime, which is baseball. There's a funny line in here for Cleveland fans. They say, "The Yankees cannot lose, but I fear those Indians of Cleveland." And it seems that the only other person that we meet in this whole novel is never really seen, but only talked about, but talked about quite a bit, and that's Joe D'Amaggio. Joe D'Amaggio, the Yankee Clipper? That's right. What did they say about Joe D'Amaggio? Well, Santiago holds Joe D'Amaggio in a very high respect, partially because he is a phenomenal baseball player, and partially because his father was a fisherman. That's right. He feels some sort of connection to D'Amaggio. Right. Yeah, and D'Amaggio is recovering from bone spurs, and he wonders what are bone spurs? Maybe I have them. Maybe you haven't just noticed them. Or that could compare with the pain of what bone spurs must feel like. After all, Joe D'Amaggio has a separate through this. Yeah. All right, let's get this old man onto the sea. How does that happen? Early in the morning, the old man wakes up like he always does. He grabs his things. He's sure to tell us that old men don't need alarm clocks, but young boys do. Indeed, and he walks over to the boy's home. He wakes up the boy and the two of them head down to the beach together. The boy's only there to help him carry his things. He's not allowed to go with him, so he's just helping him to carry his mast and his fishing gear. That's right. The boy tells Santiago I would rather fish with you, but I have to obey my father. He is my father. And Santiago respects that and knows that a boy's obedience should be to his father. Absolutely, but Santiago has made some plans for this morning. Right. 84 days is more than enough. His plan is to go far out, far further than any other boat typically goes. Further than he's ever been. Correct. Out to the deep water where the big fish swim. And he does just that. Oh, yes. But along the way, we get a quote from him about his feelings for the sea and actually how he loves the sea. He always thought of the sea as Lamar, which is what people call her in Spanish when they love her. Sometimes those who love her say bad things of her, but they're always said is those she wear a woman. Some of the younger fishermen, those who used buoys as floats for their lines and had motorboats, bought when the shark livers had brought much money spoke of her as Elmar, which is masculine. They spoke of her as a contestant or a place or even an enemy. But the old man always thought of her as feminine and as something that gave or withheld great favors. And if she did wild or wicked things, it was because she could not help them. The moon affects her as it does a woman, he thought. You know, I love this quote because it really expresses Santiago's love for the sea, but I also got the feeling he was telling us about the love he had had for his wife before she died as well. Right, there's very little mention of her, which you know that he was married once. Never says a bad thing about her and seems to miss her. He says that once there had been a tinted photograph of his wife on the wall, but he had taken it down because it made him too lonely to see it. And it was on the shelf in the corner under his clean shirt. It puts a sorrow in your heart right away for him. I'll agree with that and I'm going to read a quote that gives you a little bit more about that feeling. He no longer dreamed of storms, nor of women, nor of great occurrences, nor of great fish, nor fights, nor contests of strength, nor of his wife. He only dreamed of places now and of lions on the beach. They played like young cats in the dusk and he loved them as he loved the boy. And I think that scene of him dreaming about the lions refers back to when he was a boy himself and had spent some time on a freighter along the coast of Africa. And he remembers this scene of the lions playing. And now it's too painful for him to think about his wife or think about past disappointments. So he dreams about the lions and he thinks about those happier days when he was young. And to me that's what starts making this more than a story just about an old guy and a big fish. Absolutely. All right, but we need to get him out to the sea. Quickly Scott, can you tell me a little bit about his boat or skiff I think you called it? The call of the skiff, it has a small sail that you can mount in it. It also has ores to use as a robot. It's just the standard simple, small craft that a local Cuban fisherman would have. Figure about 14, 15 feet long. I would say no more than 15 probably closer to 12. And Manelin tells us it's got an old patch sail. It's a great description of that sail. The sail was patched with flower sacks and furled. It looked like the flag of permanent defeat. But it didn't look like a flag of permanent defeat to Santiago. No, it carried him where he needed to go. He was proud of his boat and its equipment. It gives it character. Absolutely. So, Il, the after about three or four hours of Santiago rowing himself out further than he's ever been before, he finds a spot he wants to set his fishing lines. And then he spends a few pages telling us exactly how he sets those lines. He takes great pride in how he sets his lines. He keeps him straighter than anyone else does and he keeps them with great precision. He says to himself it is better to be lucky, but he would rather be exact. Four lines out. One bait was down 40 fathoms. The second was at 75. And the third and fourth were down in the blue water at 125 fathoms. And each bait hung head down with the shank of the hook inside the baitfish, tied and sewed solid. And all the projecting part of the hook, the curve and the point was all covered with fresh sardines. He doesn't even go too fast when he's rowing or trolling because he doesn't want the drag to change the depth of those sardines. That's right, Il. He's dismissive of some of the other fishermen. He says others let them drift with the current and sometimes they were at 60 fathoms when the fishermen thought they were at 100 fathoms. But no, Santiago rose very slowly, very deliberately, keeping his bait at the right depths where he knows he can catch some fish. He's very methodical. That's right. He goes on to say to himself, I keep them with precision. Only I have no luck anymore. But who knows, maybe today, every day is a new day. It is better to be lucky, but I would rather be exact. Then when luck comes, you are ready. And part of this exactness is in following some of the other sea animals. He sees actually a sea bird flying over an area and he thinks, aha, that bird is onto something, that bird sees fish. Maybe I'll move myself over there a little bit. Santiago is a great study. He takes into account everything in nature, whether it's a bird flying and he knows exactly why it's there, or it could be the slight change in the wind. And he is such a seasoned fisherman that all of these things mean something to him and he can use it to his advantage. That's right, let's be clear about this novel. This is not a novel of man against nature. This is a novel of man with nature. Working with it and being a steward of the land and the animals. That's right. However, there are a couple things that Santiago sees that he does not like in nature, such as the Portuguese man of war. He sees one floating close by the boat and it's floating cheerfully like a little bubble and yet it's got long, deadly purple filaments trailing a yard which is three feet behind in the water. And he has a special little endearment for this man of war. Yeah, he calls it the Aguamala, which if you translate it is the bad water, which I figure is because he's made mostly of water. But he also says Aguamala, you're a whore. And he really doesn't like these Portuguese man of war. And it's because of something I didn't know. I knew that you could get stung if you touched them. What I didn't know is that if you touched the line after it has touched it, that it can also give you the effects. He really didn't like these men of war. No. But what he did like is seeing the big sea turtles eat them. I think I'd like to see a sea turtle eat them too. He loved those turtles. He loves the turtles. He used to catch them when he was a younger man. That was one of his first fishing experiences. Yes, but he says that most people are heartless about turtles because a turtle's heart will beat for hours after he's been cut up and butchered, which I didn't know. But the old man thought, "I have such a heart too." And my feet and hands are like theirs. And so he eats the white eggs to give himself strength. And he also drinks a cup of shark liver oil each day so that he can be strong like the turtles. This kind of grows. Shark oil? Mmm. The fisherman that the shark factory keep barrels of this oil around and most fishermen can't stomach this oil. Even though it's pretty good for you. And yet he will because he knows that it gives him strength. And obviously, this old, he's gotten this far. His eyesight is still good. Those fatty omega oils. That's right. Those omega-3 fatty acids are working well even before they knew what omega-3 fatty acids work. They just knew that they worked. Okay. All right. Scott, our old man is on the sea. In his 14-foot boat, he's got every line baited perfectly. He's got them all dropped precisely to the depths he wanted. Is his luck gonna change today? It starts small, Hemmingway wrote, "Just then, the stern line came tot under his foot where he had kept a loop of the line and he dropped his ores and felt the weight of the small tuners shivering pool as he held the line firm and commenced to haul it in." So he's got a little tune on the line? Fish number one. He actually is not overly excited, but he's glad. He says it'll make a beautiful bait the way 10 pounds. Wow. 10 pound bait? Yeah, it was a little surprised by that when I read that and I was like, "Wow, 10 pounds. My brother would be thrilled to catch 10 pounder." He's like my mother playing the slot machines in Lake Tahoe. She went there for the big money. She might win 50 bucks, but she's gonna put that back in. But he doesn't throw this 10 pounder back in. He's got uses for this 10 pound tuna. Like any good fisherman, he's gonna use everything for a purpose. But, Scott, he never has a chance to use this tuna as bait. He's got more success. That's right. He sees a strike on the hundred-fathom line. He sees it and feels it. He's quite certain. This is a large Marlon. And he can almost feel it through his fingertips that are lightly grabbing the rope. He talks about how he doesn't want to grip the rope too tightly because, first of all, the fish will take off with it. And if he holds it too tightly, it'll snap. So he holds it very lightly, lets it slide through his fingers. But through the vibrations and through his experience, he knows he's got a big one. It's like a beautiful, delicate dance that they do. And Santiago is just brilliant as he knows what the fish is thinking. And so he adjusts all of his actions so that the fish will not dart away, he will not jump, will not do anything that Santiago doesn't want him to do. Eldi, that's a great image. Santiago sort of dances with this fish. That's right. It takes a few minutes for him to actually fully take that bait and then he lets him pull the line for quite a while before he sets the hook. He plays with him a little bit. That's right. And I want him to swallow it deeply before you hook him. He kind of goads on the fish as he's talking to it out loud. He says, eat a little more and eat it well. And finally, when he thinks he'd eaten it enough, he strikes hard with both hands and he pulls and sets that hook. But nothing happens. But nothing happens. The quote is, the fish just moved away slowly and the old man could not raise him an inch. This is going to be one big fish. That's right. Usually you hook a fish and you can pull them. You can move them. He didn't move this one. In fact, this fish is pulling him. Uh oh. I think we're going to need a bigger boot. [LAUGHS] That's lonely. Any wishes he had the boy with him? Tell them. This actually starts a pattern with the old man. He talks to himself out loud. It's a pattern he's a little bit worried about, but he continues to do it. But what does he do now? He doesn't have the boy. And he's got a big fish caught on his hook. He's going to have to deal with this fish by himself. Well, he's old, but he's not done. And he certainly has the brains and the will to catch this fish and bring him in. And this is going to take all of his many years of experience. In fact, it's going to take him a couple of days to bring this fish in. Well, Scott, for the first 24 hours or so, this is not even a contest. The fish wins all the victories. Right. He's just pulling him steadily out further and further to see. And Il Di Santiago knows he's going to be in this for a long time. So he has to plan ahead a bit and get himself ready to hang on to this fish. Right. He takes a lot of precautions right away. First, he takes the line and puts it on his back, a quote unquote, comfortable position. He needs to take a little bit of the pressure of the rope off his hands. And by slinging it across his back first, he can at least hold on maybe with just one hand. Right. And he needs his hands when the fish makes a bigger fight. And so he's trying to save his hands till then. And while he's got the line in one hand and across his back, he commences to tie or tether all of the rest of the lines together so that in the event that the fish is going to really take off, he needs enough line to let out until the fish gets tired and is ready to die. Right. Essentially, his other bait lines are all connected to coils of rope in the boat that he can use to play out this fish. Which is impressive because if you think about it, he's using one hand to do all of this. I don't know about you, but when I was reading this, as the fish is pulling him further and further and further, I start to get afraid, is he going to get back? I mean, maybe I should be a little bit less concerned because he is such a seasoned fisherman, but I would be nervous. He doesn't even have a radio. Nothing. And he's heading out to the deep sea. That's right. Going away from the current, which would naturally take him back home. And he cannot even see the shoreline. Nor even the lights from Havana anymore. Now this struggle continues through the first night into the next morning. Santiago tries to sleep a little bit, keeping the rope wrapped around his hand a little bit so he knows if there's been any movement. But he really only gets 20 minutes here, 20 minutes there. This is a very long night. That's right. He wakes up when the line starts pulling through his hands and cutting deeply into his hand. In order to keep his strength up, he cuts up that tuna he caught first that morning and eats it raw. Never get a chance to use it as bait. Hemingway describes Santiago doing a pretty nice job of flaying this fish and laying out some nice slices, again, all with one hand. And he constantly wishes he had brought a little salt. But, Ildi, he wouldn't have had to bring salt with him. There was another way he could have done it if he had thought ahead. Right. He says, if I had brains, I would have splashed water on the bow all day and drying it would have made salt. Part of me was thinking there with that. His instincts told him not to do that because it would simply make him more thirsty and need of more water. He only had one small jug for his entire trip. That's right. Let's be clear. He only figured he'd be out for a day. So he brought only a small little bottle of water and it's almost gone. You know, this is the part of the novel that didn't quite ring true for me. The novel's been telling us all along how experienced Santiago is. He's been doing this for 50 years. And yet he forgets to do things like bring an extra bottle of water, maybe an extra knife, maybe some of those limes he could have used to make a nice little ceviche with the tuna. Those are all comfort things, though. Things that you kind of wish you had, but you don't need. And he's broke. That's true. He sold many things to get by. Let's get to the sighting of this Marlin. It's been about 36 hours since Santiago actually hooked him. But neither we nor Santiago has yet to see the fish, but he does breach the water eventually. The line rose slowly and steadily. And then the surface of the ocean bulged ahead of the boat and the fish came out. He came out unendingly and water poured from his sides. He was bright in the sun and his head and back were dark purple. And then the sun the stripes on his sides showed wide and light lavender. His sword was as long as a baseball bat and tapered like a rapier. And he rose his full length from the water and then re-entered it smoothly like a diver. And the old man saw the great sith blade of his tail go under and the line commenced to race out. He is two feet longer than the skiff the old man said. Wow, this was really a great sighting of this fish. Finally we get to see it. And Santiago sees it now as well. And I think he's even more amazed. He estimates that as being more than 1,000 pounds. And he can sell this for a would he tell us 30 cents a pound? He can't even do the math in his head. He says I need a pencil to figure that. Later on he says the type of fish thing get a man through all of winter. Nice. There's another great line just a paragraph after this quote contemplating about how majestic this fish was and how huge he is. He says, but thank God they are not as intelligent as we who kill them, though they are more noble and more able. And that's actually a theme that gets echoed a bit more a little later. Santiago considers this to be a noble battle and a noble enemy. He doesn't hate this fish. He doesn't want to kill this fish. He needs this fish. In fact, he calls it my brother. My brother the fish. There's many terms of endearments that he uses for this fish. He pitties this fish, respect him. But Scott, he still hasn't landed this fish. No, he's hooked it. He's caught it, but he needs to land it. But before he lands this fish, he promises to make a full pilgrimage to the version of Cobrae if he's able to catch him and dozens and dozens of Hellmarys and our fathers. And that's a great promise for him because he's already told us Hellmarys are easy to say, but those are fathers are very tough. And for him to promise to say a lot of our-- He's really going out on a line here. But Scott in this case, prayer might actually be working. Finally, Santiago senses a change, and this change tells him the fish may be weakening. That's right, the fish stops swimming against the current, and begins to swim with the current, showing that his strength is beginning to fade. Well, Eldy, swimming with the current was the first sign that Santiago was looking for. But there's two more signs he's looking for from the fish to tell him that the fish is starting to give up the battle. The first sign, and it happens shortly thereafter, is that the fish comes all the way to the surface and he starts to jump. And why is this important? It's really important because when he surfaces, the sacks along the back of the fish fill with air. And when they fill with air, he's not able to dive down deep into the water again. Right, it increases his buoyancy. Exactly, and if he cannot go down deep, then Santiago has a better chance of bringing him in. And we're told in the novel that he breaches through the water at dozens of times. Which is what cuts Santiago's hands because he's trying to hold onto it and yet give him enough rope to not pull the hook out of the mouth. Right, the process is as the fish breaches the water, Santiago pulls a little rope in. As the fish goes back under the water, he lets a little rope out. Right. Back and forth. Which is the dance again. But as the line goes through his hands, it is making deeper and deeper cuts. And Scott, finally, the third sign that Santiago is waiting for occurs. The fish begins to circle along the surface of the water. And why is this good for Santiago in bad for the fish? Enable Santiago to slowly pull the fish in where he can get the harpoon. He's literally reeling this fish in with the help of the fish. Eventually the fish will give in and let himself be pulled up to the boat. Closer and closer and finally, with the harpoon. Right through the heart. First shot. Alright, Scott, so he kills this big fish with a harpoon through the heart. But now you gotta tell me, how's he gonna get an 18-foot fish into a 14-foot boat? The short answer is you don't. Too big, it would sink the boat. So he ties the fish up alongside the boat and sets sail for home. But as he's lashing it, he realizes that he may have underestimated the weight of this fish. And now he estimates it at probably over 1500 pounds. And Scott, now that Santiago can actually relax for a moment, he begins to take notice of his aches and pains. He wasn't really able to deal with when he was fighting this fish. But now, with nothing else to do, he starts to catalog his wounds. And again, Joe DiMaggio comes up. That's right, it's a great line here. I think the great DiMaggio would be proud of me today. I had no bone spurs, but the hands and the back hurt truly. I wonder what a bone spur is, he thought. Maybe we may have them without knowing of it. Yes, clearly he's in pain, but there's also other emotions. He's happy now. He's got his pride back. His luck has come back. These are good things for Santiago. And all he has to do is look at the fish to know it wasn't a dream. And the next sentence in that same paragraph, it was an hour before the first shark hit him. And I got to tell you, just the directness and quickness of that line hits me as much as the shark hit that fish. I get goosebumps. And Scott, read me the quote from Hemingway. The shark was not an accident. He had come up from deep down in the waters. The dark cloud of blood had settled and dispersed in the mild deep sea. The first shark was a huge meco. With eight rows of teeth, each one the size of a finger. Cloth-like. That's right, Hemingway spends about a page telling us about this meco shark. And what I thought was amazing is that with one bite, that meco shark took 40 pounds. This is not going to end well for Santiago or the fish, is it? No. Not likely. In fact, he allows the shark to get one good bite out of him. And he sticks that harpoon into the shark. And Hemingway writes, "The old man knew that he was dead, the shark would not accept it." And he swam away with the harpoon. So now Santiago has lost his only weapon? No, he still has a knife which he can lash to his or and use that as a short stubby harpoon. And he's going to need that knife because more sharks are coming. That's right, two hours later, a pair of sharks show up. These are slightly different than the first meco shark. That's right, the meco almost seems a little bit majestic, the way he's describing him. Powerful, strong, with the fastest fish in the sea. And he's a hunter rather than a scavenger. Yes, Santiago almost respects this shark for doing what it does as well as it does. This is a fine animal as well. Again, man with nature, not man against nature. But these two new sharks, he doesn't like these guys at all. No, they're scavengers. They're shovel-nosed sharks. He calls them galanos. And actually, have the quote from Hemingway, "They were hateful sharks, bad smelling, scavengers as well as killers. And when they were hungry, they would bite at an ore or a rudder of a boat." It was these sharks that would cut the turtles' legs and flippers off when the turtles were asleep on the surface. And they would hit a man in the water if they were hungry. Even if the man had no smell of fish blood nor a fish lime on them. Ah, galanos. Come on galanos, the old man said. And they came. But they didn't come as the make-o. How did they come? They're sneaky. Almost like wolves. Exactly. They come and one of them goes under the boat so that Santiago can not get a hold of them. And he starts to rip away at the underside of the fish. All the while, Santiago was actually feeling this vibration to his boat. Right, he can feel them hitting the fish constantly. And yet, there's nothing he can do about it. Right, he's got to keep his eye on the second shark, which is just out a little bit of a ways. He's got his knife ready, but the shark's got to get a little closer. And he does. Yes, eventually both sharks come close enough for Santiago to get to them. And he does. But this is not the end of a shark attack. No, later just before darkness, the next shovel-no shark shows up. Pemmingway writes, he came like a pig to the trough. If a pig had a mouth so wide, you could put your head in it. That's right. This is a single shark. A single shark. And a very unfortunate one. He jabs them with the knife blade, the shark twists and turns, and the knife blade snaps off. So that's two weapons down. There's not much left in that boat to use. There's not much left of this fish, is there either? No. Half of them is gone at this point. And all you can do now is to club the sharks, which is a very difficult thing to do. And clubbing them will not kill them. It may stun them. Right. It may send them away for a while, but it's not going to keep them from finishing off this fish. Offly tough to club a shark to death. And it's awfully tough to club them in the darks since it is now darkness. Tell me how this ends. Well, Hemingway writes, "What can a man do against them in the dark without a weapon?" All he has left at this point is a club, which will eventually be lost to a shark who grabs it and swims away with it. And then he goes to the tiller to this boat and continues to beat the sharks with the tiller off his boat until he breaks that. And jabs the broken piece into one of the sharks. That's right. He's gotten so frustrated with these sharks and what they've done to his fish that he's now attacking them with whatever he can get his hands on. Even pieces of the boat almost as bare hands. But, Ildi, what have they done to his fish? It's so sad. It reads, "He did not like to look at the fish anymore since he had been mutilated. When the fish had been hit, it was as though he himself were hit." You know, Ildi, it is sad. And Santiago can tell even in the dark that most of this fish is gone. He notices the skiff is sailing much better, much lighter now, much faster now that there's no great weight tied beside it. He thinks to himself, "It is easy when you're beaten and what beat you? Nothing. He just went out too far." Scott had his novel end. He finally pulls into his home beach, middle of the night. No one is out about. Everyone is sleeping. He gets out of the skiff. No one can help him pull the boat up so he pulls it up as far as he can and starts walking up the hill. And he realizes the depth of his tiredness so much so that he collapses on the way up the hill. I think you left out one small little detail that I'd like to mention. As he's walking back up to shore, he's carrying his mast across his shoulders and he falls. You're right, which makes that fall all the more profound. How's that? It's very biblical of Christ carrying his cross and falling the first time. And he actually has to rest several more times. Five more times to make it up to the hill to his shack. And when he gets to his shack, he falls on his bed and how does he fall on his bed? He sleeps face down on the newspapers with his arms out straight and the palms of his hands up. And that's how the boy finds him the next morning. And Manelame comes to the shack. He sees the old man's hands and he starts to cry. He sees the scars, the cuts, the marks, and the fish and the line for the last three days of fighting. But this isn't the only way Manelame knows that Santiago's been in a great battle. That's right. He's already been down to the beach, saw the boat, saw the skeleton of the fish. There's just a skeleton left still lash to the boat. And the tail is soaring up above the skiff. It's that large. And actually it's being measured by some of the other fishermen and they decide it was at least 18 feet long. Correct. And Ildi, at the end of our novel, there's just two final very poignant, very sad moments. What really broke my heart is that there are some tourists looking at the skeleton of this fish. And they ask, what is that? And one of the waiters who is trying to explain it but not very well, he says, "S shark." Trying to explain what had happened to the fish that he was eaten by sharks. And the ignorant tourists don't understand and they think it was a shark. Right. The woman says, "I didn't know sharks had such handsome beautifully formed tails." Oh, it just kills you that this man Santiago almost died for this fish and they're just misinterpreting everything. They would have eaten this fish but they would have had no idea what it looked like. And it just goes to show you that Santiago is right. The people who eat these fish are not even worthy to eat the fish. And Scott, the final, final poignant moment. Up the road in the shack, the old man was sleeping again. He was still sleeping on his face and the boy was sitting by him watching him. The old man was dreaming about the lions. And that's how Hemingway ends his novel, The Old Man in the Sea. So sad. It was very sad at the end. Extremely sad. Scott, Ildi, even in a novella, there are some moments and some scenes we didn't have a chance to get to. And what I'd like to do now is maybe visit one or two of those scenes and talk about them. Scott, do you have something? Yeah, one of my favorite themes from the entire novel is what it means to be a man and how do men react to the things that happen to them. And I kind of piece together a series of five different quotes from the novel and I'll just read them in succession. First, pain does not matter to a man. Next, men control pain. Next, suffer like a man. He tells himself in towards the end. Man is not made for defeat. A man can be destroyed but not defeated. And finally, what beat you? Nothing beats. And these are the same kind of references he makes to Joe Demaggio. Nothing is beaten Joe Demaggio. Not even bone spurs. Joe Demaggio is playing through pain. And this means a lot to Santiago. You're right. This is how a man behaves. That's right. This is how a man should live. Thinking may have had a little idealized vision of the pain of Demaggio. I think Santiago suffered quite a bit more than Demaggio. Is it a time or scene? I do. I was struck in the whole novel by Santiago's will. He's an old man and yet he will not give up. That is the one thing that defines him, his will. While he's in the boat, he remembers a time in his life when he was a young man that he had an arm wrestling match with a man. There's many people who came to watch this match. They're placing bets constantly and the time goes on and on. And the match had started on a Sunday morning and it ended on a Monday morning. There were men who wanted this match to end so badly because they didn't want to go to work and leave the watching of the match there. And so Santiago decides I must finish this before the people have to go to work. And his will and his determination finally beat this man. And he says in the novel, he decided that he could beat anyone if he wanted to badly enough. Ah, the famous Hemingway Makismo comes out. Yeah. But even in a Hemingway novel, there's some tender, sweet moments. And the one that comes to my mind is during the fight with the fish, a little bird lands on Santiago's boat. And Santiago talks to the bird and he says, "Hello, little bird. You seem tired. You can rest here a little while." How old are you? Is this your first trip? The bird looked at him when he spoke. He was too tired, even to examine the line. And he teetered on it as his delicate feet gripped it fast. It's steady, the old man told the bird. It's too steady. You shouldn't be that tired after a winless night. What are birds coming to? [laughs] What I found just sad is that Santiago gets distracted. And when he looks back to see that bird, it's gone and he feels lonely. Someone else is leaving him. So much for Hemingway's maquismo. Yeah. Scott, Ildy, also in the novel, there were many references that we said were biblical references. The cuts on Santiago's hands remind us of the stigmata that Christ suffered. When he carries his mask, both to the boat and from the boat, he carries it across his shoulders almost as if he's carrying a piece of the cross. Am I reading too much into this or was some of that really there? I thought it's pretty clear. There's another quote. "When the sharks are coming, he says a word, I, and there's no translation for this word, and he says, perhaps it is just a noise such as a man might make involuntarily, feeling the nail go through his hands and into the wood." I think that's pretty clear that that's a Christian reference. So it's there. Absolutely. Even the way the battle time is being described as evening came the next day. One of the thought I had, this may be an English literature question, but why was this not called the old man and the big fish? Why was it the old man and the sea? The sea gave him a favor. As he was describing Lamar as a woman who gives you good things, and the fish was one of the things that the sea gave him. So it was bigger than just a fishing story. - Correct. - Ildi? There's so many other characters, shall we say. Like their bird or the Portuguese man of war or the turtles. It is about the fish, and yet it's about where they all live in the sea. And Santiago basically lives in the sea as well. And all of his past memories of his youth and different jobs all involve the sea. That's great. I think that's where we're going to end today's conversation. I want to thank you both, Ildi and Scott, for coming in and having this conversation with me. - It's been great. - My pleasure. I'm your host, Frank Levalo, and today I had a conversation about the novel, "The Old Man and the Sea" by Ernest Hemingway. Joining me now for end notes on today's novel conversation is our researcher, Ted Schwartz. Ted, hello. Hi, Frank. It's good to be back. And as always, good to have you. Now, Ted, one thing I don't think we mentioned during our novel conversation about the old man and the sea that I wanted to get out right away, this is the last novel published before Ernest Hemingway's death. Yes, and ironically, he was on his fishing boat, the peeler, when he learned he had won the Nobel Prize for what would prove to be his last published book during his lifetime. Now, Ted, readers and fans of Ernest Hemingway believe this novel to be his most autobiographical. Are we right about that? You're right, he was a fisherman. And because his longtime companion, boat captain, mess sergeant for 22 years, Gregorio Fuentes, was old. He eventually died at 104. People assume that Hemingway was writing about him. In truth, that wasn't accurate. Well, then who was he writing about? Fuentes explained this in an interview when he was around 100 years old. He said that they were going along Cuba's north coast, and they saw an old man in the skiff fighting a big fish. And later, somebody else mentioned it was a Marlon. Sharks had surrounded him, and he was in a fierce battle. Fuentes said, "We stopped and offered to help, but the old man shouted for us to get away." Later, we heard the old man had died, with saddened Papa deeply, and Papa was the name by which Hemingway was known to many of his close friends. I know that is why he wrote the book. Well, Ted, I can see where this incident might have provided the bones of the story of the old man in the sea. But clearly, he had to have brought some personal experience to this. Yes and no. At the time, he had never done anything quite that dramatic. But after the old man in the sea was published, Fuentes tells us that he and Hemingway were sailing off the coast of Peru, and he caught a 1,542-pound sailfish. And Fuentes said, "It was just the two of us, and it took three hours to catch, was he ever excited." And later, Fuentes said he felt that landing that fish brought Hemingway more pride than any book he ever wrote. Well, Ted, I think that's a very neat fact that he got to live his novel after he'd written it. But at least he managed to survive it. The man who was his inspiration did not. That's right. Well, Ted, another interesting fact about the old man in the sea is that, unlike his other novels, and actually we probably could call the old man in a sea of novella, this one was published in a magazine, and not in book form first. Yes, and the only thing that made that unusual at the time when it was published in Life magazine was that it was published as a single book complete in one issue instead of a serial. It was immediately followed by the hardcover publication with almost immediate sales of 50,000 copies. Well, Ted, I understand this legacy of Hemingway and his fishing still continues in Cuba today. Yes, in kind of a humorous way, in 1960 he established the first and the discontinued after his death, Ernest Hemingway fishing tournament. And there is a man he absolutely hated, who legitimately won the first tournament, and everyone was shocked by the fact that he legitimately won it. As a man named Fidel Castro. Well, Hemingway may have hated Castro, but I understand the old man in the sea is still required reading for high school kids in Cuba. Not only that, but if you go down to one of the churches in Cuba, you'll find the gold medals that Hemingway had won for the Nobel Prize. He personally left it there. It wasn't something after his death. He loved Cuba. That was his home the last years of his life. All right, well, Ted, thank you very much for coming in and bringing us end notes on today's conversation about the novel, The Old Man in the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. Thank you for having me. You're welcome. I also want to thank our novel Conversations Readers, Ildi and Scott Rich. You've been listening to novel conversations. Today I had a conversation about the novel The Old Man in the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. I'm your host, Frank Lovallo. Until next week, I hope you find yourself in a novel conversation. This podcast was produced with the support of the Ohio Motion Picture Tax Credit and in partnership with the Ohio Development Services Agency.