Old Man and the Sea - Lavoie

First off, I would like to congratulate the seniors that participated in Battle of the Bands this year. It took us four, hard-fought years, but we did it. A special shout out to Larsen who was the Winter Carnival MVP in my opinion. I'm pretty sure addressing the meaning of the work as a whole is one of the things we have to do, so I'm going to try my best to put something cohesive together. Here goes nothing. Here's the one-sentence summary of the end of the book -- the man catches the fish, it is eaten by sharks, he makes it home and goes to bed. Riveting. I have discussed how this book is pretty much strictly metaphorical, which means there are a lot of angles to interpret from. The one that stuck out most to me is the man vs. nature narrative which provides the story's foundation. So if this is a man vs. nature story, what is Hemingway try to say about man and nature? On the surface, you could say that he is arguing that man's place in the world should not ...

Alright, I’m going to try and keep this real short and sweet. Would I write about this book on the AP Literature AP Test? The short answer: absolutely not. Here’s why. In my opinion, the question three free response question should be answered using a book that has a clear, surface-level connection between the essay prompt and the story’s themes. If anyone in this class got an essay prompt about the portrayal of women in society, you would be stupid to choose anything other than the Handmaid’s Tale (sure other stories like Macbeth address the topic, but Handmaid’s Tale has so many overt themes about gender roles that it is an obvious choice) . So far in The Old Man and the Sea , however, the majority of explored themes have been far from surface level. Take the topic of my previous post, for example: characterization. Sure, there are plenty of complexities to explore about the old man’s character in this story. His pride urges him to make poor decisions (like chasing a freakin’ fi...

Do you remember how angry you probably were walking out of the theater when you saw The Last Jedi ? Everyone got really freakin’ hyped for the new Star Wars movie, but then found out it was just two and a half hours of two spaceships chasing each other, with some other really weird stuff mixed in. I feel that exact same anger now after finishing the first half of, let me remind you, AWARD WINNING The Old Man and the Sea. Basically the whole book is about an old guy chasing a big fish with some weird other really weird stuff mixed in. That’s it. I’m not exaggerating. I just spent thirty minutes reading about a guy just holding onto a rope and getting dragged out to sea by a fish. What the H. So how does Ernest manage to write so much about so little? It’s his excruciating style. I know The Old Man and the Sea is not truly about the old man or the sea for that matter. It is really an extended metaphor, similar to journey myths of the ancient world, which bring into question princ...

I have to be honest, I am not super excited to read this book. I like Hemingway for his efficient,  journalistic writing style; but, I really do not want to read a book all about freaking fishing. I mean,  yeah, the book is only like a hundred pages, but that’s not gonna stop me from complaining about  the fact that this story is literally about the most boring activity on Earth. On top of that, I have some  vague idea that this story has something to do with Jesus, which liking fishing, is something I know  close to zero about. Whenever I read this book I feel like I’m either misunderstanding some biblical  allegory or experiencing man’s most insufferable aquatic activity through literature. But, I have to write  about this book for the next month, so I’ll have to do the unthinkable and find some things I actually  like about Ernest’s renowned fishing flick. So, I guess the logical place to begin is with character. The book opens des...