In the novel The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway the main character, Santiago, shows many examples of perseverance. Santiago works very hard but gets very little in return. But he doesn’t give up, even in his impoverished condition. He still tries. He goes fishing every day even though he catches little to nothing. Another example of perseverance is when Santiago finally has a fish on his hook but can’t get it up without losing it. He then stays out for a few days persisting that he catches the marlin. And the last example is how the boy never gives up on Santiago even though he has such bad luck. Santiago is an old fisherman who has the worst of luck. He goes out fishing every day but comes home to his shack empty handed. “I could just drift, he thought, and sleep and put a bight of line around my toe to wake me. But today is eighty-five days and I should fish the day well. Just then, watching his lines, he saw one of the projecting green sticks dip sharply," (Hemingway 13). This quote reveals much about Santiago and the theme of the book. It has been eighty-five days since …show more content…
He shows it in his devotion to the old man. “Where did you wash? the boy thought. The village water supply was two streets down the road. I must have water here for him, the boy thought, and soap and a good towel. Why am I so thoughtless? I must get him another shirt and a jacket for the winter and some sort of shoes and another blanket.” (21) The young boy cares a lot for the old man and he shows it by his thoughts. He worries about what the old man needs and how he is cared for. Manolin refuses to give up on the old man and gives Santiago hope. He takes good care of him and loves him. Even though there are a lot of reasons to give up on the old man, Manolin doesn’t. Perseverance doesn’t have to be shown in big ways. It can be show in small, but meaningful, ways. The young boy is a good example of
The film Cinderella Man shows multiple examples of perseverance. Perseverance is when someone is determined to go through tough obstacles and difficulties, no matter how hard they seem to be. If someone were to face obstacles that seem impossible, they could go through them, or persevere, and try their best to overcome it instead of just giving up. If someone was to have perseverance, they would be persistent and continuously stay in the state they are, no matter how hard their problems are. Cinderella Man has multiple examples of this because the main character, James J. Braddock, perseveres through the difficult time that is the Great Depression. He took risks to fend for his family and never succumbed to his negative feelings when he faced problems that would feel almost impossible. James Braddock had shown examples of perseverance in the movie Cinderella Man.
There comes a time in everyone's life when they will want to give up. It seems to be easier to give up rather than persevere through any tough obstacles that throws at you. There are three quotes from three books that demonstrates perseverance in the books called “The Lost boys”, “Mother to Son”, and “Saudi Arabia's Freedom Riders”. The first quote that demonstrates perseverance is from the book “Mother to Son”. This lady gave advice to her son about life.
In the novel "The Alchemist", Santiago is a young shepherd in search of his personal legend. To find your personal legend you need to have qualities like intelligence, understanding, and perseverance. The quality that is key to success is perseverance. Perseverance is doing something despite the difficulty in achieving success. Through searching, for his personal legend, he has gone through many obstacles like losing his sheep, crossing the desert, and turning himself into the wind. He persevered through it all and found his personal legend.
One example of perseverance in “The Most Dangerous Game” is when Rainsford falls off his boat. Instead of letting the surf overtake him, he fights to stay above water. “He struggled up to the surface
When faced with adversity, certain characteristics will help people succeed in overcoming the obstacle in their way. While others who don’t possess these characteristics, often end up succumbing to the adversity. One characteristic of people that overcome adversity often have is perseverance. While reading the books assigned for summer reading I realized that two of the books contained characters that used their personal perseverance to overcome certain problems and obstacles. These characters are Santiago from The Alchemist and Juror #8 from Twelve Angry Men.
Manolin is very devoted to the old man. Though he is not allowed to go fishing with Santiago, he aids the old man however he can. “’Keep the blanket around you,’ the boy said. ‘You’ll not fish without eating while I’m alive,’” (Hemingway 19). This statement uncovers how much Manolin cares for the old man. Manolin wants to be there for the old man, however difficult it may be for him. The two characters divulge a bond that is unbreakable because of how much they love and care for each other. Though Santiago is not able to fish as well as he used to, Manolin still believes in him. Manolin has faith in Santiago and that is root of their relationship. “’Que va,’ the boy said. ‘There are many good fishermen and some great ones. But there is only you,’” (Hemingway 23). Manolin’s devotion to Santiago highlights the old man’s values and beliefs as a fisherman and as a person. Manolin admires the old man and cannot contain his love for Santiago. He sees himself reflected in Santiago, which is why he has an abundant amount of love for him.
Along with Gatsby’s determination, using The Old Man and The Sea, which is based in Cuba, the reader can still see many parallels to American hopes and dreams when Santiago doesn’t give up on his hopes and dreams to catch a fish. While talking to Manolin, Santiago remarks: “‘Eighty-five is a lucky number’ (Hemingway 16).” The remark gives detail to the reader of Santiago’s trust in himself and his own
Even though he is an adolescent boy, Manolin loves spending time with Santiago. He loves to go out fishing with him but, his parents no longer will let him. The reason for this is because Santiago has not caught a fish for eighty-four days. As a result of this unfortunate occurrence, others deem Santiago the term salao, or the worst kind of unlucky. Knowing the struggle Santiago is facing, Manolin tries to help him in as many ways as possible. Manolin brings Santiago drinks, food and the newspaper so they can talk about baseball and the great Joe DiMaggio. In spending all this time with the old man, Manolin develops a form of respect for him. He comes to understand that despite the recent unlucky situations, Santiago remains hopeful as well as prideful. This is why Manolin looks up to the old man so much. “Santiago… I could go with you again. We have made some money. The old man had taught the boy to fish and the boy loved him” (Hemingway 10). Along with just loving Santiago for himself, Manolin also looks up to him because Santiago taught him how to fish. Manolin understands that he is a large part of Santiago’s life and feels honored and
Never giving up and working hard is challenging that requires a lot of perseverance. In the book The Call of the Wild Buck was dognapped and had to work hard if he wanted to live through the cold winter. At the same time, my father had to persevere through college, failing one of his classes. Nevertheless Buck and my father are different in handling situations. They both used their qualities of perseverance to get through the challenges that they were faced with.
In the novella, The Old Man and the Sea, Santiago is an unlucky fisherman who has not caught anything in 84 days. Yet he sets out alone on the 85th day to try again. For three days he struggles with a large marlin which he finally kills; but, despite his best efforts, he loses the fish to repeated shark attacks.
“He did not truly feel good because the pain from the cord across his back had almost passed pain and into dullness that he mistrusted.”(74) Once both the fish and Santiago had reached the breaking point of conflict the story seemed to slow down in time to exemplify the adverse conditions that both characters were suffering from. The old man proves himself worthy of personal suffering with the cuts and scars on his hands and back along with all of the pulling and slipping the cords had upon his fragile body. Hemmingway shows in a big way how an out of proportioned conflict with an old fisherman and an 18 foot long marlin helps to magnify the significance of Santiago searching for his rebirth to manhood. With constant abstraction describing the fish and the sea in relation to brotherhood create interesting questions for Santiago to ponder. His rationalization for his fishing is that he was born to do it. “A man can be destroyed but not defeated.” (103) Hemmingway proves that this fish represents all of Santiago’s built up tension to total the size of a gigantic marlin that is perceived as devastating but not unconquerable. The old man’s hopes and aspirations can overcome the adversity of the marlin’s size, along with the conditions of the old, hungry, and exhausted fisherman. Through outright suffering Santiago achieves a goal above his previous manhood by combating pain and
In perspective of the book, the struggle the main character faces the majority of the time is man vs nature because, Santiago battle against an enormous fish, the strong currents, and his battle against sharks. In the first chapter of the novel, Santiago’s been out 84 days without a fish. He then caught an enormous fish that well passed the capacity of his skiff on his 85th day. Santiago sees the number “85”
When describing the man he said “the old man was thin and gaunt with deep wrinkles in the back of his neck (9)”. This depicts how old Santiago really was and how close he was to the end of his life. Hemingway also described the flag on his sail as “looking like the flag of permanent defeat (9)”. This quote foreshadows Santiago’s eventual death which was caused by going out at sea past his ordinary limits.
Over and over again he is remarked to be a strange old man, and he himself is the one to glorify that. He seems to struggle with the fact that he must prove himself to the other fisherman who mock him and believe him to be a fallen hero. He sets off to sea in his boat one day, but what he does not know that it will be the three most tiring days of his life. He first catches a smaller fish and instead of turning back, he decides to go farther out into the ocean to see what he can catch with that fish. He soon is dragged all over and back by a shiny purple marlin, that is two feet longer than his skiff. The response to Santiago’s poor decision or lack of creativity to harpoon the marlin instead of try to kill it another was as to not attract mako sharks was confusing. He is shown to be a man of intelligence and greatness, yet his decision to kill the marlin in this manner knowing what could happen proves that he had a distinct motive for harpooning the fish. By the words of Gery Brenner, “that motive is self validation-the need to prove himself”(Brenner 55). In the end, after the three day struggle, when Santiago returns to the dock, he is told by Manolin later that he was said to be lost at sea, and everyone was completely taken away by the length of the mangled carcass that he brought in. The take many get from Hemingway’s novel is
“Everything about him was old except his eyes and they were the same color as the sea and were cheerful and undefeated”Hemingway develops Santiago as a hero in order to show how fragile things can be strong in the inside.Even Though santiago seemed like a weak old man, while he was alone at sea trying to catch a fish;he demonstrates how strong,positive,and undefeated he is.