Is Santiago a tragic Hero?

What is a tragic flaw?

"A man cannot become a hero until

he can see the root of his own downfall."

Aristotle

A tragic flaw is a literary term that refers to a personality trait of a main character that leads to his or her downfall. Tragic heroes typically have to deal with tough decisions and strange twists of fate, and they end up dead or defeated by the end of the story.

Reading for April 25

The Old Man and the Sea

By Ernest Hemingway

Part 7

Friendship Assignment

The Old Man and the Sea

Ernest Hemingway

The Relationship between Santiago & Manolin

Why does Santiago so often wish that Manolin were on the boat with him?

This is a simple question, but I want us to go beyond a simple answer. Review the following conversations between Santiago and Manolin from the beginning of the story. You are going to chose one of these conversations and explain how Hemingway uses dialogue to show the depth of their relationship. Why does he wish the boy were on the skiff with him? Is it for help, or is there more to it than that? How can you tell?

Reading for April 21

The Old Man and the Sea

By Ernest Hemingway

Part 6

Reading for April 18

The Old Man and the Sea

By Ernest Hemingway

Part 5

Vocabulary 1

skiff - scythe - treacheries - intolerable - proprietor - pivoted - la mar 
benevolent - fathom - rapier - humility - gaunt - undulation - plankton
bonito - furled - ineffectual - myriad - pectoral - bight - conscientious phosphorescence - malignancy - filaments

Please match the words above to the definitions below the jump. While some definitions might seem to apply to more than one word, there is one ideal definition for each word. Each one of the words above have been mentioned in the reads we have completed so far.

The "Iceberg" Effect

Writing Style and Depth

Critics, and your teacher, have described Hemingway’s style as ‘the iceberg effect’ – because the extreme simplicity masks hidden depths of meaning (like an iceberg, which is mostly hidden beneath the surface of the ocean).

1) Remind yourself of the passage on page 54, another point at which Santiago is talking to himself. “‘The fish is my friend, too,’ he said aloud ... ‘It is enough to live on the sea and kill our own true brothers.’“ (near the end of Part 4)

This passage is densely packed with meaning, yet it is expressed in very simple vocabulary and sentence structure. The old man is debating:

• the conflicts in his feelings about the marlin

• the conflicts in his feelings about his relationship with nature

• the meaning of luck, fate and chance

• his feelings about himself

• the concept of worth.

2) For each of these bullet points write down the opposing ideas that they contain and the key words or phrases used to describe them.

Reading for April 13

The Old Man and the Sea

By Ernest Hemingway

Part 4

Introduction to Topic Paper

Writing an Introduction

Essays about literature are almost always argumentative. While they can be purely informational, or expressive, any interpretation of a work is, in essence, some sort of argument. The argumentative nature of an essay emerges from the relationship between the work of literature and the reader. Good literature is complex, and it usually involves multiple layers of meaning. A complete understanding of those layers of meaning requires more information than just the words on the page. It is up to the critical reader to provide some of that information through their own perception of the work. No single reader’s view can be all-encompassing, but through a reader’s use of observation, reasoning, interpretation, and creativity, a sound argument about a work can be made.
 

Review for quiz, parts 1-3

The first quiz for The Old Man and the Sea is coming up. Remember that you are allowed to use your notes on the quiz.

- Focus on the issues we discussed during and after the in-class reading we did for each part of the story.

- Don't just remember what the symbols or the themes or the descriptions are. Instead, try to think about how they are used and what they mean to the story as a whole.

- Think about Hemingway's writing style and the "iceberg" theory we discussed on the first day of the unit.

- Relax, keep up with the reading and you will do just fine.

Reading for April 11, 2011

The Old Man and the Sea

By Ernest Hemingway

Part 3

Animated Man and the Sea, part 1

 Old Man and the Sea animated video:

 

Reading for April 7, 2011

The Old Man and the Sea

By Ernest Hemingway

Part 2

What kind of hero is this old man?

What makes a hero?

In the comments section, list 5 qualities that you believe a hero must possess. These qualities can be aspects of fictional characters that you have read about in the past, or of real-life heros that are members of our society. Please think carefully about these qualities.

Part 1 Discussion

The following issues were discussed in class today following our reading. Please respond to at least two of the questions/issues following the jump in the comments section:

Reading for April 5, 2011

The Old Man and the Sea

By Ernest Hemingway

Part 1

Introduction to The Old Man and the Sea

Hemingway was born in Oak Park, IL in 1899. In his youth he was an active outdoorsman and a talented athlete. Following high school, Hemingway worked as a reporter for the Kansas City Star. In May of 1918, Hemingway volunteered for duty in WWI as an ambulance driver on the Italian Front, where he wounded his legs. Following his return home, Hemingway settled in Paris, where he was a part of the “Lost Generation” of post-WWI writers, a group that included Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ezra Pound. By the late 1920s, Hemingway had written a number of well-received short stories and novels (A Farewell to Arms, The Sun Also Rises). In the 1930s, Hemingway filled his life with adventure; he hunted big game in Africa, fished the Gulf off Cuba, and reported on the Spanish Civil War (For Whom the Bell Tolls) and WWII. Following the publication of The Old Man and the Sea, Hemingway's health began to deteriorate, and he suffered from hypertension, diabetes, depression and paranoia. Despite treatment, Hemingway committed suicide on July 2, 1961.    

Hemingway has been praised for his ability to write shorter narratives. His style is noted for its simplicity, sparseness, and understatement. He subscribed to the “iceberg” theory of writing: just as the bulk of an iceberg is below the surface, what is actually read in fiction is only a small portion of what is going on.

"If a writer of prose knows enough about what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows and the reader, if the writer is writing truly enough, will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them. The dignity of movement of an iceberg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water."

- Death In the Afternoon, Scribner's, 1932, Chap. 16, 192.

 The novella The Old Man and the Sea was published in 1952, in a special edition of Life magazine. The story won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and a year later, Hemingway was awarded the Nobel Prize for vwas defined as the achievement of one's spiritual and personal destiny. Cubans also place a high value on machismo, or maleness. Men are not expected to live up to the demands of the ideal male, but they are expected to cultivate their masculinity, through military, athletic, intellectual, or sexual exploits, to come close. Each of these themes come up throughout the story.   

Classroom Rules

C L A S S R O O M   R U L E S