Santiago and Manolin's Friendship

The Old Man and the Sea presents trials of friendship between Santiago, the old man who goes out to catch the fish, and Manolin, a young boy who is part of a different fishing boat's crew but enjoys the presence of Santiago. Being apart from Santiago nearly every day on the other boat, Manolin does not get too many chances to have conversations with his old friend, so he practically adopts the old man as his father or grandfather because of the number of visits he gives him. Every morning, Manolin walks to the old man's house to help him get his fishing gear together and wish him fair catch for the day; as Santiago leaves the dock, Manolin walks back to his boat to board and start his own day. Then, in the evening, Santiago comes back to the dock, and Manolin is there to greet him and help take his things back to the house for the old man to get to bed. Being separated from each other for so many hours during the day, there would also be quite a few scepulations over how the pair could remain friends without hardly any social interaction. It seems Manolin would eventually grow tired of going to visit Santiago day after every long day. It is not possible to think of new things to talk about without having one of those things in common. Also, when Santiago does not came back in after he hooked the marlin, Manolin's patience would be tested. Should he wait for him the first night? Should he check if he has come in by the second morning? What about the third? After about two or three days, I would have given up on the old man. However, what would Santiago think when Manolin did not show up to help him one day? But, Manolin did not fail the old man; in fact, he helped the old man get through by giving him something to think about other than the huge fish. Manolin was a big help for Santiago because Santiago knew the whole time that Manolin would always be his true friend.

The "Marlin"

Old Man and the Sea was, well, stubborn. Reading was boring, uneventful, and nearing the point of dropping the book. That was until the old man on the sea finally was able to reel in his monster of a fish. This "marlin" put up an amazing fight for just a fish, tugging the old man's boat for days, then surfacing momentarily only to go back under to pull the boat even further. In my opinion, it was not actually a fish. It must have been either some sort of illusion put on by Santiago's own mind or an anchor that had come apart from its ship and was hooked accidentally. In the case of the anchor, the old man must also have been insane to think he saw it swimming. The current system in the ocean must have moved the anchor, which then also tugged the boat in a whole, unnecessarily exagerated fashion. Supposedly, Santiago was also able to hold onto the swimming fish with only his hands clamped to the line for dear life; it seems completely impossible for anything to hold onto anything voluntarily for too much more than about half an hour. Even if Santiago did summon such a strength, how was he unable to make any sort of headway on the fish? The question remains without an answer. Or why would he want to stay with the fish for so long, knowing he was slowly being pulled farther and farther away from home, making it harder and harder on himself to get the beast back into shore? It sounds quite unrealistic, and the author, Ernest Hemingway, should have asked himself these sorts of questions before finalizing his thoughts in the book. Still, without understanding the flaws in the story, the plot in entirety was enticing but fairly predictable. A man went out to find the catch of a lifetime, found it, fought it, and was inevitably doomed from the start of taking more than he could chew, literally because he never was able to chew it.

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Ok, well after a few troubles, I figured out how to actually post things into my blog! Thanks Mr. Lanlgey!