Book Review: The Old Man and the Sea

The Old Man & the Sea. By Ernest Hemingway

Time for a book review!

I haven't actually read that many books lately. Not novels anyways.

As you know, I am on vacation! and I found this book in our beach house by my night stand. I peeked at it and thought, you know, I feel like reading a classic. I'm on the beach and here is this book about the sea. I should read it. And so I did.

It was a quick read, which I liked. It has no chapters, you just read the book. But it felt good to read it. The language isn't difficult by any means. It's simple. But for some reason the story has stuck with me. Simple yet powerful. I'm sure many people would say the same.

"The Old Man and the Sea won the 1953 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, and it likely cinched the Nobel Prize for Hemingway in 1954, as it was cited for particular recognition by the Nobel Academy. It was the last novel published in his lifetime." (from Spark Notes)

You know how I like to post pictures, so I Googled The Old Man and the Sea and found a ton of beautiful pictures. The hard part was choosing the ones I liked best.

I looked up the Spark Notes for this because, especially with classics, I like to know the significance of certain things.

Here is an example of why I enjoyed the book so much: "Hemingway’s strength and mastery lies in his ability to render concrete but still poetic images using familiar words and simple vocabulary." There is a scene where the Old Man has to kill a fish and he hits it on the head, "but for kindness"... "Hemmingway described this technique as the “iceberg principle,” for he believed that the simplest writing, when done well, would hint at the greatest human truths, just as the tip of an iceberg hinted at the terrific frozen mass that rested underwater." And that's definitely true. I got a clear sense of the characters even when they weren't explained in detail. 

The copy that I found was similar to this in style. Although it had no picture. Old looking. Very cool to hold in my hand and read by the sea.

And that is all. I would recommend it.

I found this little Youtube short video. Check it out:  The Old Man and the Sea