The Old Man and the Sea: Question 2

The main story of the book was an old fisherman basically battling a giant fish that was bigger than his boat, all by himself. Just knowing that, it would not be much of a leap to assume that there are going to be many external and internal conflicts throughout the book. The reader will definitely not be disappointed in the area of conflict.

First of all, as with most books, between external and internal conflicts, external conflict is the easiest one to spot mostly because when I (and I assume other people do to, but you just never know) read, I try to picture what the author is trying to describe, which makes it easier to visualize two separate things in conflict rather than having to imagine a person arguing with themselves (Inception?). Anyway, the obvious external conflict was the several day battle between the marlin and the old man. Later on, as the story draws to a close, Hemingway adds in one last conflict, one last slap to the face of the old man: he already was drug out to sea by a giant fish, cut his hands, almost drove him to death by exhaustion, then sharks eat the old man’s beloved fish that he fought so hard for. The old man really got the short end of the stick on this one.

Luckily the internal conflicts in this novella were not at all hard to pick up on, thanks to the frank writing style Hemingway uses. Another way that the author made it even easier for the reader, is that he made it so that the old man spoke to himself, so it was more like there was only external, no internal, conflicts. One of the main internal conflicts the old man has is that he wishes he had the boy with him to help him with the fish (Hemingway 37). Frankly, it gets kind of old the longer you read, because he says it over and over again, but I guess repetition gets the point across quickly. Another internal conflict is that the old man still knows how to fish and he is skilled enough to catch almost any size fish, but his old body is making it hard to put to use what his mind is telling him to do. The easiest way to realize this is when his hand cramps up and he verbally chastises it (Hemingway 48). He realizes that he’s “getting to old for this kind of thing”, and maybe that is why he will not quit until he catches this fish, it may be his last big catch.

Hemingway, Ernest. The Old Man and the Sea. New York: Scribner, 1980. Kindle. Web. 21 June 2011.