The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway

A Coming of Age Story for the Final Stages of Life

I’ll be honest, I’ve not read a lot of Earnest Hemingway… well to be completely transparent this is the only Ernest Hemingway piece I’ve read. As a bookophile, that is almost a blasphemous statement. However, I am redeemed int he fact that I absolutely adored this novella!

In spite of it’s bitesized length, I’d say 3-4 hours of reading for a fast reader this book is a captivating read.

Hemingway manages to almost entirely tell a heart-touching narrative with a single character, or at the very least a single human character. The Old Man for the most part is the readers sole focal point and Hemingway is able to bring to life a living breathing world through the eyes of this old man.

Yet, Hemingway also masterfully turns nature and the world into characters into themselves! Whether it be fish that the old man encounters, a seagull or even the ocean itself.

The Old Man and the Sea is an amazing depiction of what it’s like to grow old, the social impacts of the process and how one individuals deal with the fact that aging is an inevitability of life we must all accept.