By Brianna T.

Everyday people go through everyday struggles, from not being able to find an outfit, to fighting to survive the deadly, cancer disease. We learn to overcome and fight through these challenges, its part of our human nature. And even if it is difficult or tiring, or even puts our lives in jeopardy, we always seem to get through them.

In the novella The Old Man and the Sea, by Ernest Hemingway, Santiago has to overcome many struggles and challenges. He fights the elements of Mother Nature, hunger, exhaustion and fatigue, and let’s not forget, the ferocious sharks. He fights all of theses elements alone at sea, at the age of 85, just to catch a one stubborn marlin.

Santiago isn’t what you would call rich or wealthy, so he can’t just run down to the corner store when he’s hungry. He has to work for his food. For 84 days now, he has gone out to sea, and has come back empty handed each time.

“ ‘What do you have to eat?’ The boy asked.

‘A pot of yellow rice with fish. Do you want some?’

‘No. I will eat at home. Do you want me to make the fire?’

‘No. I will make it later on. Or I may eat the rice cold.’

‘May I take the cast net?’

‘Of course.’

There was no cast net and the boy remembered when they had sold it. But they went through this fiction every day. There was no pot of yellow rice and fish and the boy knew this too.” (16) This quote shows that the old man really doesn’t have food and he hasn’t eaten in so long. “There was no pot of yellow rice and fish and the boy knew this too.” This part in the quote tells you the boy knows the man has no food because he hasn’t caught a fish in days, and he is very poor, and has nothing. Plus, he lies to the boy because he doesn’t want the boy to worry about him not eating. He is old and needs nutrition, but he hasn’t had too much luck lately. But will his luck change on the 85^th, as it has in the past? He would soon find out.

His luck changes after hooking a marlin on the line. But the fish does something out of the ordinary. He swims straight. He doesn’t swerve or try to get lose, he just swims and drags the boat and Santiago farther out to sea. Santiago follows the marlin for 3 days. He has no food and is getting weak. But with his smart mind and fishing techniques he is able to catch some small fish for some well needed nutrition. With no way to cook it he eats them raw, yuck. That’s not what you would picture as and ideal meal.

While battling the violent elements of Mother Nature, the old man is also fighting to keep his eyes open. The old man has been following the marlin for three days at sea, and has barely gotten any sleep. And not to mention he sleeps on a pile of newspapers at home, and that can’t be too comfortable, and holding on to that big fish is tiring and sucking the energy right out of him. He is old and brittle and needs his rest. His hand is cramping from gripping the rough line for three days straight, He hasn’t had much rest of the boat, because he needs to keep an eye on the marlin. And when it was time to finally catch the marlin, he feels tired and finally admits it.

“I’m tireder than I have ever been, he thought, and now the trade wind is rising. But that will be good to take him in with [the marlin]. I need that badly.” (89)This quote shows how tired the old man is getting. He is malnourished and over tired, and he needs all the help he can get to catch fish.

After all that hard work and finally killing the beast of the sea, Santiago finds out that the marlin is bigger than his boat. There is no way he can put it on his small boat. So, he attaches it to the side, and he was off, on his voyage back home. But what Santiago didn’t know was that many, many, many fathoms down, and many, many miles away, hungry sharks were waiting.

Sharks can smell blood from 50 miles away! Their was blood leaking into the cool, ocean water from the gash on the side of the marlin, where Santiago’s spear took the its life. And even though the bleeding stopped after a while, the sharks had already sniffed out the trail and where near by. And let’s keep in mind that the 1500 pound marlin is out in the open, and all Santiago has for a weapon is one spear and a small knife.

“ The shark’s head was out of water and his back was coming out and the old man could hear the noise of skin and flesh ripping on the big fish when he rammed the harpoon down onto the shark’s head at a spot where the line between his eyes intersected with the line that ran straight back from his nose.” (102) I picked this quote because it shows how Santiago fought these sharks off. “he rammed the harpoon down onto the shark’s head” this is the part of the quote where Santiago actually kills the demon. The shark in the quote actually took a huge chunk from the marlins side. And that’s not all that he took. As the shark sunk down to the dark depths of the ocean the spear was still logged in his skull, taking away the old man’s biggest weapon. And since the shark took a bite out of the fish, of course, it started bleeding again. Knowing now that more sharks were bound to come, Santiago took the knife and put it in his oar to make a spear-like weapon. He killed off two more sharks before making all the way home.

In conclusion we find that throughout the voyage of catching the marlin, Santiago has to overcome some pretty rough challenges. He has to survive hunger, fatigue, and fierce man eating sharks. And the amazing thing is that he does all this alone, at the age of 85. I mean, that’s pretty unbelievable if you ask me. How many 85 year olds do you know, that could accomplish what Santiago had in the book The Old man and the Sea?