加载中…老人与海 英文版
(2013-03-13 23:17:24)
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分类： 英语世界 |
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The Old Man and the Sea
By Ernest Hemingway
To Charlie Shribner
And
To Max Perkins
He was an old man who fished alone in a sk iff in the Gulf
Stream and he had gone
eighty-four days now without taking a fish. In the first forty
days a boy had been with him.
But after forty days without a fish the boy’s
parents had told him that the
old man was
now definitely and finally salao, which is
the worst form of unlucky, and the boy had
gone
at their orders in another boat which caught
three good fish the first week. It made the
boy sad to see the old man come in each day with his skif f
empty and he always went
down to help him carry either the coiled lines or the gaff and
harpoon and the sail that
was furled around the mast. The sail was patched with flour
sacks and, furled, it looked
like the flag of permanent defeat.
The old man was thin and gaunt with deep wrinkles in the back
of his neck. The
brown blotches of the benevolent skin cancer
the sun brings fr om its [9] reflection on
the
tropic sea were on his cheeks. The blotches ran well down
the sides of his face and
his
hands had the deep-creased scars from handling heavy fish on
the cords. But none of
these scars were fresh. They were as old as erosions
in a fishless desert.
Everything about him was old except his eyes and they
were the same color as
the
sea and were cheerful and undefeated.
“Santiago,” the boy said to him as they cl imbed the bank from
where the skiff was
hauled up. “I could go with you again. We’ve
made some money.”
The old man had taught the boy to fish and the boy loved him.
“No,” the old man said. “You’re with a lucky
boat. Stay with them.”
“But remember how you went eighty-seven days without fish and
then we caught big
ones every day for three weeks.”
The Old Man and the Sea
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“I remember,” the old man said. “I know you did not leave me
because you doubted.”
“It was papa made me leave. I am a boy and I
must obey him.”
“I know,” the old man said. “It is quite normal.”
“He hasn’t much faith.”
[10] “No,” the old man said. “B ut we have. Haven’t we?”
“Yes,” the boy said. “Can I offe r you a beer on the Terrace
an d then we’ll take the stuff
home.”
“Why not?” the old man said. “Between fishermen.”
They sat on the Terrace and many of the fishermen made fun of
the old man and he
was noteangry. Others, of the older fishermen, looked at him
and were sad. But they
did
not show it and they spoke politely about the current and the
depths they had drifted
their lines at and the steady good weather
and of what they had seen. The
successful
fishermen of that day were already in and
had butchered their marlin out and
carried
them laid full length across two planks, with two men
staggering at the end of each plank,
to the fish house where they waited for the
ice truck to carry them to the market in
Havana. Those who had caught sharks had taken them to the
shark factory on the other
side of the cove where they were hoisted on
a block and tackle, their
livers removed, their
fins cut off and their hides skinned out and their flesh cut
into strips for salting.
When the wind was in the east a smell came across the harbour
from the shark
factory; but today there [11] was only the fa int edge of the
odour because the wind had
backed into the north and then dropped off and it was pleasant
and su nny on the Terrace.
“Santiago,” the boy said.
“Yes,” the old man said. He was holding his glass and thinking
of many years ago.
“Can I go out to get sardines for you for tomorrow?”
“No. Go and play baseball. I can stil l row and Rogelio will
throw the net.”
“I would like to go. If I cannot fish with
you. I would like to serve in some way.”
“You bought me a beer,” the old ma n said. “You are already a
man.”
“How old was I when you firs t took me in a boat?”
“Five and you nearly were killed when I brought the fish in
too green and he nearly
tore the boat to pieces. Can you remember?”
“I can remember the tail slapping and banging and the thwart
breaking and the
noise of the clubbing. I can re member you throwing me into
the bow where the wet coiled
lines were and feeling the whole boat shiver
and the noise of you clubbing him
like
chopping a tree down and the sw eet blood smell all over me.”
[12] “Can you really remember that or did I
just tell it to you?”
The Old Man and the Sea
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“I remember everything from when we first went together.”
The old man looked at him with his
sun-burned, confiden t loving eyes.
“If you were my boy I’d take you out and
gamble,” he said. “But you are
your father’s
and your mother’s and you are in a lucky boat.”
“May I get the sardines? I know where I can get four baits
too.”
“I have mine left from today. I put them in
salt in the box.”
“Let me get four fresh ones.”
“One,” the old man said. His hope and his confidence had never
gone. But now they
were freshening as when the breeze rises.
“Two,” the boy said.
“Two,” the old man agreed. “You didn’t steal them?”
“I would,” the boy said. “But I bought
these.”
“Thank you,” the old man said. He was too
simple to wond er when he had attained
humility. But he [13] knew he had attained it and he knew it
was not disgraceful and it
carried no loss of true pride.
“Tomorrow is going to be a good day with this current,” he
said.
“Where are you going?” the boy asked.
“Far out to come in when the wind shifts. I want to be out
before it is light.”
“I’ll try to get him to work far out,” the
boy said. “Then if you hook something
truly
big we can come to your aid.”
“He does not like to work too far out.”
“No,” the boy said. “But I wi ll see something that he
cannot see such as a bird
working and get
him to come out after dolphin. ” “Are his eyes that bad?” “He
is almost blind.” “It is
strange,” the old man said. “He never went turt le-ing. That
is what kills the eyes.” “But
you went turtle-ing for years off the Mosquito Coast and your
eyes are good.”
“I am a strange old man”
“But are you strong enough now for a truly big fish?”
“I think so. And there are many tricks.”
[14] “Let us take the stuff home,” the boy
said. “So I can get the cast net and go
after
the sardines.”
They picked up the gear from the boat. The old man carried the
mast on his shoulder
The Old Man and the Sea
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and the boy carried the wooden boat with the coiled, hard
-braided brown lines, the gaff
and the harpoon with its shaft. The box with the baits was
under th e stern of the skiff
along with the club that was used to subdue the big fish when
they were brought
alongside. No one would steal from the old man but it was bett
er to take the sail and the
heavy lines home as the dew was bad for them and, though he
was quite sure no local
people would steal from hi m, the old man thought that a gaff
and a harpoon were
needless temptations to leave in a boat.
They walked up the road together to the old man’s shack and
went in through its
open door. The old man leaned the mast with
its wrapped sail against the wall and the
boy put the box and the other gear beside it. The mast was
nearly as long as the one room
of the shack. The shack was made of the to ugh budshields of
the royal palm which are
called guano and in it there wa s a bed, a table, one chair,
and a place on the dirt floor to
cook with charcoal. On the brown walls of the
flattened, overlapping leaves
of the sturdy
fibered [15] guano there was a picture in color of the Sacred
Heart of Jesus and another
of the Virgin of Cobre. These were relics of
his wife. Once there had been a tinted
photograph of his wife on the wall but he had taken it down
because it made him too
lonely to see it and it was on the shelf in the corner unde r
his clean shirt.
“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 th e 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. “Eighty-five is a lucky number,” the ol d man said. “How
would you like to see me
bring one in that dressed out over a thousand pounds?” “I’ll
get the cast net and go for
sardines. Will you sit in the sun in the
doorway?”
[16] “Yes. I have yesterday’ s paper and I will read the
baseball.” The boy did
not
know whether yesterday’s paper was a fiction
too. But the old man brought it out
from
under the bed.
“Perico gave it to me at the bodega,” he explained. “I’ll be
back when I have the
sardines. I’ll keep yours and mine together on ice and we can
share them in the morning.
When I come back you can tell me about the baseball.”
“The Yankees cannot lose.”
“But I fear the Indians of Cleveland.”
The Old Man and the Sea
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“Have faith in the Yankees my son. Think of the great
DiMaggio.”
“I fear both the Tigers of Detroi t and the Indians of
Cleveland.”
“Be careful or you will fear even the Reds of Cincinnati and
the White Sax of
Chicago.”
“You study it and tell me when I come back.”
“Do you think we should buy a terminal of
the lottery with an eighty-five? Tomorrow
is the
eighty-fifth day.” “We can do that,” the boy said. “But what
about the eighty-seven of
your great record?”
[17] “It could not happen twice. Do you
think you can find an eighty-five?”
“I can order one.
“One sheet. That’s two dollars and a half. Who can we bo rrow
that from?”
“That’s easy. I can always borrow two dollars and a half.”
“I think perhaps I can too. But I try not to borrow. First you
borrow. Then you beg.”
“Keep warm old man,” the boy said. “Remember we are in
September.”
“The month when the great fish come,” the old man said.
“Anyone can be a
fisherman in May.”
“I go now for the sardines,” the boy said.
When the boy came back the old man was asleep in the
chair and the sun was
down.
The boy took the old army blanket off the bed and spread it
over the back of the chair
and
over the old man’s shou lders. They were strange shoulders,
still powerful although very
old, and the neck was still strong too and the creases did no
t show so much when the old
man was asleep and his head fallen forward. His shirt had been
patched so many times
that it was like the sail and the patches were
faded to many differen t shades by the
sun.
The [18] old man’s head was very old though
and with his eyes closed there was no life
in
his face. The newspaper la y across his knees and the weight
of his arm held it there in
the
evening breeze. He was barefooted.
The boy left him there and when he came back the old man was
still asleep.
“Wake up old man,” the boy said and put his hand on one of the
old man’s knees.
The old man opened his eyes and for a moment he was coming
back from a long way
away. Then he smiled.
“What have you got?” he asked.
“Supper,” said the boy. “We’re going to have supper.”
The Old Man and the Sea
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“I’m not very hungry.”
“Come on and eat. You can’t fish and not eat.”
“I have,” the old man said getting up and
taking the newspaper and folding it.
Then
he started to fold the blanket.
“Keep the blanket around you,” the boy said.
“You’ll not fish without eating while
I’m
alive.”
“Then live a long time and take care of yourself,” the old man
said. “What are we
eating?”
“Black beans and rice, fried bananas, and some stew.”
[19] The boy had brought them in a two-de cker metal container
from the Terrace.
The two sets of knives and forks and spoons
were in his pocket with a paper
napkin
wrapped around each set.
“Who gave this to you?”
“Martin. The owner.”
“I must thank him.”
“I thanked him already,” the boy said. “You
don’t need to thank him.”
“I’ll give him the belly meat of a big fish,”
the old man said. “Has he done this for
us
more than once?”
“I think so.”
“I must give him something mo re than the belly meat then.
He is very thoughtful for
us.”
“He sent two beers.”
“I like the beer in cans best.”
“I know. But this is in bottles, Hatuey
beer, and I take back the bottles.”
“That’s very kind of you,” the old man said.
“Should we eat?”
“I’ve been asking you to,” the boy told hi m gently. “I have
not wished to open the
container until you were ready.”
[20] “I’m ready now,” the old man sai d. “I only needed time
to wash.”
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.
The Old Man and the Sea
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“Your stew is excellent,” the old man said.
“Tell me about the baseball,” the boy asked him.
“In the American League it is the Yankee s as I said,” the old
man said happily.”
“They lost today,” th e boy told him.
“That means nothing. The great DiMaggio is himself again.”
“They have other men on the team.”
“Naturally. But he makes the difference. In the other league,
between Brooklyn and
Philadelphia I must take Brooklyn. But then I think of Dick
Sisler and those great
drives
In the old park.”
“There was nothing ever like them. He hi ts the longest ball I
have ever seen.”
“Do you remember when he used to come to the Terrace?”
[21] “I wanted to ta ke him fishing but I was too timid to ask
him. Then I asked you to
ask him and you were too timid. ” “I know. It was a great
mistake. He might have gone
with us. Then we would have that for all of our lives.” “I
would like to take the great
DiMaggio fishing,” the old man said. “They say
his father was a fisherman. Maybe he
was
as poor as we are and would understand.” “The great Sisler’s
father was never poor and
he, the father, was playing in the Big Leagues when he was my
age.” “When I was your
age I was before the mast on a square rigged ship that ran to
Africa and I
have seen lions on the beaches in the evening.”
“I know. You told me.”
“Should we talk about Africa or about baseball?”
“Baseball I think,” the boy said. “Tell me
about the great John J.
McGraw.” He said
Jota for J.
“He used to come to the Terrace sometimes too in the older
days. But he was rough
and harsh-spoken and difficult when he was drinking. His mind
was on horses as well as
baseball. At least he carried lists of [22] horses at all time
s in his pocket and frequently
spoke the names of horses on the telephone.”
“He was a great manager,” the boy said. “My
father thinks he was the greatest.”
“Because he came here th e most times,” the old man said. “If
Durocher had
continued to come here each year your father would th ink him
the greatest manager.”
“Who is the greatest manager, really, Luque or Mike Gonzalez?”
“I think they are equal.”
“And the best fisherman is you.”
The Old Man and the Sea
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“No. I know others better.”
“Que Va,” the boy said. “The re are many good fishermen and
some great ones. But
there is only you.”
“Thank you. You make me happy . I hope no fish wi ll come
along so gr eat that he will
prove us wrong.”
“There is no such fish if you are still
strong as you say.”
“I may not be as strong as I think,” the ol d man said. “But I
know many tricks and I
have resolution.” “You ought to go to bed no w so that you
will be fresh in the morning. I
will take the things back to the Terrace.”
[23] “Good night then. I will wake you in
the morning.”
“You’re my alarm clock,” the boy said.
“Age is my alarm clock,” the old man said. “W hy do old men
wake so early? Is it to
have one longer day?”
“I don’t know,” the boy said. “All I know is
that young boys sleep late and hard.”
“I can remember it,” the old man said. “I’ll
waken you in time.”
“I do not like for him to waken me. It is as though I were
inferior.”
“I know.”
“Sleep well old man.”
The boy went out. They had eaten with no light on the ta ble
and the old man took off
his trousers and went to bed in the dark. He
rolled his trousers up to make a pillow,
putting the newspaper inside them. He rolled
himself in the blanket and slept on the
other old newspapers that cove red the springs of the bed.
He was asleep in a short time and he drea med of Africa when
he was a boy and the
long golden beaches and the white beaches, so white they hurt
your eyes, and the high
capes and the great brown moun tains. He lived along that
coast now every night and
in
his dreams he heard the surf roar and saw the native boats
[24] come riding through it.
He smelled the tar and oakum of the deck as he slept and he
smelled the smell of
Africa
that the land breeze brought at morning.
Usually when he smelled the land breeze he woke up and dressed
to go and wake the
boy. But tonight the smell of the land breeze
came very early and he knew it was too
early
in his dream and went on dreaming to see the white peaks of
the Is lands rising from the
sea and then he dreamed of the different harbours and
roadsteads of the Canary Islands.
He no longer dreamed of storms, nor of
women, nor of great
occurrences, nor of
great fish, nor fights, nor contests of strength, nor of his
wife. He only dreamed of places
now and of the lions on the beach. They played like young cats
in the dusk and he loved
them as he loved the boy. He never dreamed about the boy. He
simply woke, looked out
the open door at the moon and unrolled his
trousers and put them on. He urinated
The Old Man and the Sea
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outside the shack and then went up the road to wake the boy.
He was shivering with the
morning cold. But he knew he would shiver himself warm and
that soon he would be
rowing.
The door of the house where the boy lived was unlocked and he
opened it and
walked in quietly with his [25] bare feet. The
boy was asleep on a cot in the first room
and
the old man could see him clearly with the light that came in
from the dying moon. He
took hold of one foot gently and held it
until the boy woke and turned and looked at
him.
The old man nodded and the boy took his trouse rs from the
chair by the bed and, sitting
on the bed, pulled them on.
The old man went out the door and the boy
came after him. He was sleepy and
the
old man put his arm across his shou lders and said, “I am
sorry.”
“Qua Va,” the boy said. “It is what a man
must do.”
They walked down the road to the old man’s shack and all along
the road, in the dark,
barefoot men were moving, carryi ng the masts of their boats.
When they reached the old man’s shack the boy took the rolls
of line in the basket
and the harpoon and gaff and the old man carr ied the mast
with the furled sail on
his
shoulder.
“Do you want coffee?” the boy asked.
“We’ll put the gear in the boat and then get some.”
They had coffee from condensed milk cans at
an early morning place that served
fishermen.
“How did you sleep old man?” the boy asked.
He [26] was wa king up now although it
was still hard for him to leave his sleep.
“Very well, Manolin,” the old man said. “I feel confident
today.”
“So do I,” the boy said. “Now I must get your
sardines and mine and your fresh
baits.
He brings our gear himself. He ne ver wants anyone to carry
anything.”
“We’re different,” the old man said. “I let you carry things
when you were five years
old.”
“I know it,” the boy said. “I’ll be right
back. Have another coffee. We have
credit
here.”
He walked off, bare-footed on the coral rocks, to the ice
house where the baits were
stored.
The old man drank his coffee slowly. It was all he would have
all day and he knew
that he should take it. For a long time no w eating had bored
him and he never carried a
lunch. He had a bottle of water in the bow of the skiff and th
at was all he needed for the
day.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 10 -
The boy was back now with the sardines and the two baits
wrapped in a newspaper
and they went down the trail to the skiff, feeling the pebbled
sand under their feet, and
lifted the skiff and slid her into the water.
[27] “Good luck old man.”
“Good luck,” the old man said. He fitted the
rope lashings of the oars onto the thole
pins and, leaning forward agains t the thrust of the blades in
the water, he began to
row
out of the harbour in the dark. There were other boats from
the other beaches going out
to sea and the old man heard the dip and push of their oars
even though he could not see
them now the moon was below the hills.
Sometimes someone would speak in a boat. Bu t most of the
boats were silent except
for the dip of the oars. They sp read apart after they were ou
t of the mouth of the harbour
and each one headed for the part of the ocea n where he hoped
to find fish. The old man
knew he was going far out and he left the smell of the land
behind and rowed out into the
clean early morning smell of the ocean. He saw the
phosphorescence of the Gulf weed in
the water as he rowed over the part of the
ocean that the fishermen called the great
well
because there was a sudden de ep of seven hundred fathoms
where all sorts of fish
congregated because of the swirl the current made against the
steep walls of the floor of
the ocean. Here there were concentrations of
shrimp and bait fish and sometimes
schools
of squid in the deepest holes and these rose close to the
surface at night where all the
wandering fish fed on them.
In the dark the old man could feel the morning coming and as
he rowed he heard the
trembling sound as flying fish left the water
and the hissing that their stiff set wings
made
as they soared away in the darkness. He was very fond of
flying fish as they were his
principal friends on the ocean. He was sorry for the birds,
especial ly the small delicate
dark terns that were always flying and looking and almost ne
ver finding, and he thought,
the birds have a harder life than we do except for the robber
birds and the heavy strong
ones. Why did they make birds so delicate an d fine as those
sea swallows when the ocean
can be so cruel? She is kind and very beauti ful. But she can
be so cruel and it comes
so
suddenly and such birds that fly, dipping and hunting, with
their small sad voices are
made too delicately for the sea.
they love her. Sometimes thos e who love her say bad things of
her but they are always
said as though she were a woman. Some of the younger
fishermen, those who used
buoys
as floats for their lines and had motorboats, bought [29] when
the shark livers had
brought much money, spoke of her as el mar which is masculine.
They spoke of her as a
contestant or a place or even an enemy. But
the old man always thought of her as
feminine and as something that gave or
withheld great favours, and if she did wild
or
wicked things it was because she could not help them. The moon
affects her as it does a
woman, he thought.
He was rowing steadily and it was no effort for him since he
kept well within his
speed and the surface of the ocean was flat except for the
occasional swirls of the current.
He was letting the current do a third of the work and as it st
arted to be light he saw he
was already further out than he had hoped to be at this hour.
The Old Man and the Sea
He always thought of the sea as l a mar
which is what peop le call her in Spanish
when
- 11 -
I worked the deep wells for a week and did
nothing, he thought. Today I’ll work out
where the schools of bonito and albacore are
and maybe there will be a big one with
them.
Before it was really light he had his baits out and was
drifting with the current. One bait
was down forty fathoms. The second was at seventy-five and the
third and fourth were
down in the blue
water at one [30] hundred and one hundred and twenty-five
fathoms. Each bait
hung head down with the shank of the hook in side the bait
fish, ti ed and sewed solid and
all the projecting part of the hook, the cu rve and the point,
was covered with fresh
sardines. Each sardine was hooked through both
eyes so that they made a half-garland
on
the projecting steel. There was no part of th e hook that a
great fish could feel which was
not sweet smelling and good tasting.
The boy had given him two fresh small tunas,
or albacores, which hung on the two
deepest lines like plummets and, on the others, he had a big
blue runner and a yellow
jack that had been used before; but they
were in good condition still and had
the
excellent sardines to give them scent and
attractiveness. Each line, as thick around as
a
big pencil, was looped onto a green-sapped st ick so that any
pull or touch on the bait
would make the stick dip and each line had two forty-fathom
coils which could be made
fast to the other spare coils so that, if it
were necessary, a fish could take out over
three
hundred fathoms of line.
Now the man watched the dip of the three sticks over the side
of the skiff and rowed
gently to keep the [31] lines straight up and down and at th
eir proper depths. It was quite
light and any moment now the sun would rise.
The sun rose thinly from the sea and the old man could see the
other boats, low on
the water and well in toward the shore, spre ad out across the
current. Then the sun was
brighter and the glare came on th e water and then, as it rose
clea r, the flat sea sent it back
at his eyes so that it hurt sharply and he
rowed without looking into it. He looked
down
into the water and watched the lines that went
straight down into the dark of the
water.
He kept them straighter than anyone did, so that at each level
in the darkness of the
stream there would be a bait waiting exactly wh ere he wished
it to be for any fish
that
swam there. Others let them drift with the current and
sometimes they were at sixty
fathoms when the fishermen thou ght they were at a hundred.
But, he thought, I keep them with precision.
Only I have no luck any more. But
who
knows? Maybe today. Every day is a new day. It is better to
be lucky. But I would
rather
be exact. Then when luck comes you are ready.
The sun was two hours higher no w and it did not [32] hurt his
eyes so much to look
into the east. There were only three boats in
sight now and they showed very low and
far
inshore.
All my life the early sun has hurt my eyes,
he thought. Ye t they are still good. In
the
evening I can look straight into it without ge tting the
blackness. It has more force in
the
evening too. But in the mo rning it is painful.
Just then he saw a man-of-war bird with his long black wings
circling in the sky
ahead of him. He made a quic k drop, slanting down on his
back-swept wings, and then
The Old Man and the Sea
- 12 -
circled again.
“He’s got something,” the old man said aloud. “He’s not just
looking.”
He rowed slowly and steadily toward where
the bird was circling. He did not
hurry
and he kept his lines straight up and down. But he crowde d
the current a little so that he
was still fishing correctly though faster than he would have
fished if he was not trying to
use the bird.
The bird went higher in the air and circled
again, his wings motionless. Then he
dove
suddenly and the old man saw flying fish spurt out of the
water and sail desperately over
the surface.
[33] “Dolphin,” the old man sa id aloud. “Big dolphin.”
He shipped his oars and brought a small line from under the
bow. It had a wire
leader and a medium-sized hook and he baited
it with one of the sardines. He let it
go
over the side and then made it fast to a ring
bolt in the stern. Then he baited another
line
and left it coiled in the shade of the bow. He went back to
rowing and to watching
the
long-winged black bird who was work ing, now, low over the
water.
As he watched the bird dipped again sl anting his wings for
the dive and then
swinging them wildly and ineffectually as he
followed the flying fish. The old man
could
see the slight bulge in the water that the big
dolphin raised as they followed the
escaping
fish. The dolphin were cutting through the
water below the flight of the fish and would
be
in the water, driving at speed, when the fish
dropped. It is a big school of dolphin,
he
thought. They are widespread and the flying
fish have little chance. The bird has
no
chance. The flying fish are too big for him and they go too
fast.
He watched the flying fish burst out again and again and the
ineffectual movements
of the bird. That school has gotten away from
me, he thought. They are moving out
too
fast and too far. But perhaps I will pick up
[34] a stray and perhaps my big fish is
around
them. My big fish must be somewhere.
The clouds over the land now rose like mountains and the coast
was only a long
green line with the gray blue hills behind
it. The water was a dark blue now, so dark
that
it was almost purple. As he looked down into
it he saw the red sifting of the plankton
in
the dark water and the strange light the sun made now. He
watched his lines to see them
go straight down out of sigh t into the water and he was ha
ppy to see so much plankton
because it meant fish. The strange light the sun made in the
water, now that the sun was
higher, meant good weather and so did the shape of the clouds
over the land. But the bird
was almost out of sight now and nothing showed on the surface
of the water but some
patches of yellow, sun-bleached Sargasso weed and the purple,
fo rmalized, iridescent,
gelatinous bladder of a Portuguese man-of-war floating dose
beside the boat. It turned on
its side and then righted itself. It floated
cheerfully as a bubble with its long deadly
purple
filaments trailing a yard behind it in the water.
“Agua mala,” the man said. “You whore.”
From where he swung lightly against his oars he looked
down into the water and
saw
The Old Man and the Sea
- 13 -
the tiny fish that [35] were coloured like
the trailing filaments and swam between
them
and under the small shade the bubble made as
it drifted. They were immune to its
poison.
But men were not and when same of the filaments would catch on
a line and rest there
slimy and purple while the old man was workin g a fish, he
would have welts and sores on
his arms and hands of the sort that pois on ivy or poison oak
can give. But these
poisonings from the agua mala came quickly and struck like a
whiplash.
The iridescent bubbles were beautiful. But they were the
falsest thing in the sea and
the old man loved to see the big sea turt les eating them. The
turtles saw them,
approached them from the front, then shut their eyes so they
were completely carapaced
and ate them filaments and al l. The old man loved to see
the turtles eat them and
he
loved to walk on them on the beach after a storm and hear them
po p when he stepped on
them with the horny soles of his feet.
He loved green turtles and hawk-bills with their elegance and
speed and their great
value and he had a friendly contempt for the huge, stupid
loggerheads, yellow in their
armour-plating, strange in their [36] love-making, and happily
ea ting the Portuguese
men-of-war with their eyes shut.
He had no mysticism about turtles although he had gone in
turtle boats for many
years. He was sorry for them all, even the grea t trunk backs
that were as long as the skiff
and weighed a ton. Most people are heartless
about turtles because a
turtle’s heart will
beat for hours after he has been cut up an d butchered. But
the old man thought, I have
such a heart too and my feet and hands are
like theirs. He ate the white eggs to give
himself strength. He ate them all through May
to be strong in September and October
for
the truly big fish.
He also drank a cup of shark liver oil each day from the big
drum in the shack where
many of the fishermen kept their gear. It was there for all
fishermen who wanted it. Most
fishermen hated the taste. But it was no worse
than getting up at the hours that they
rose
and it was very good against all colds and grippes and it
was good for the eyes.
Now the old man looked up and saw that the bird was circling
again.
“He’s found fish,” he said al oud. No flying fish broke the
surface and there was no
scattering of bait [37] fish. But as the old
man watched, a small tuna rose in the
air,
turned and dropped head first into the water.
The tuna shone silver in the sun and
after
he had dropped back into the water another and another rose
and they were jumping in
all directions, churning the water and leaping in long jumps
after the bait. They were
circling it and driving it.
If they don’t travel too fast I will get
into them, the ol d man thought, and he
watched
the school working the water white and the bi rd now dropping
and dipping into the bait
fish that were forced to the surface in their panic.
“The bird is a great help,” the old man said. Just then the
stern line came taut under
his foot, where he had kept a loop of the line, and he dropped
his oars and felt tile weight
of the small tuna’s shivering pull as he held the line firm
and commenced to haul it
in.
The shivering increased as he pulled in and he
could see the blue back of the fish in
the
water and the gold of his sides before he swung him over the
side and into the boat. He
The Old Man and the Sea
- 14 -
lay in the stern in the sun, compact and bullet shaped, his
big, unintelligent eyes staring
as he thumped his life out against the planking of the boat
with the quick shivering
strokes of his neat, fast-moving [38] tail. Th e old man hit
him on the head for kindness
and kicked him, his body still shuddering, under the shade of
the stern.
“Albacore,” he said aloud. “He’ll make a
beautiful bait. He’ll weigh ten pounds.”
He did not remember when he had first started to talk aloud
when he was by himself.
He had sung when he was by himself in the old days and he had
sung at night sometimes
when he was alone steering on his watch in the smacks or in
the turtle boats. He had
probably started to talk aloud, when alon e, when the boy had
left. But he did not
remember. When he and the boy fished togeth er they usually
spoke only when it was
necessary. They talked at night or when they were storm-bound
by bad weather. It was
considered a virtue not to talk unnecess arily at sea and the
old man had always
considered it so and respected it. But now he said his
thoughts aloud many times since
there was no one that they could annoy.
“If the others heard me talking out loud they would think that
I am crazy,” he said
aloud. “But since I am not crazy, I do not care. And the rich
have radios to talk to them in
their boats and to bring them the baseball.”
[39] Now is no time to think of baseball, he thought. Now is
the time to think of only
one thing. That which I was born for. There might be a big one
around that school, he
thought. I picked up only a st raggler from the albacore that
were feeding. But they
are
working far out and fast. Everything that shows on the surface
today travels very fast and
to the north-east. Can that be the time of day?
Or is it some sign of weather that I do
not
know?
He could not see the green of the shore now but only th e tops
of the blue hills that
showed white as though they were snow-capped
and the clouds that looked like high
snow mountains above them. The sea was very
dark and the light made prisms in
the
water. The myriad flecks of the plankton we re annulled now by
the high sun and it was
only the great deep prisms in the blue water that the old man
saw now with his lines
going straight down into the water that was
a mile deep.
The tuna, the fishermen called all the fish
of that species tuna and only distinguished
among them by their proper names when they
came to sell them or to trade them
for
baits, were down again. The sun was [40] hot
now and the old man felt it on the back
of
his neck and felt the sweat trickle down his back as he rowed.
I could just drift, he thought, and sleep and put a bight of
line ar ound 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.
“Yes,” he said. “Yes,” and shipped his oars
without bumping the boat. He reached
out
for the line and held it softly between the
thumb and forefinger of his right hand. He
felt
no strain nor weight and he held the line lightly. Then it
came again. This time it was a
tentative pull, not solid nor heavy, and he knew exactly what
it was. One hundred
fathoms down a marlin was eating the sardines that covered the
point and the shank of
The Old Man and the Sea
- 15 -
the hook where the hand-forge d hook projected from the
head of the small tuna.
The old man held the line delicately, and soft ly, with his
left han d, unleashed it from
the stick. Now he could let it run through his
fingers without the fish feeling any tension.
This far out, he must be huge in this month, he thought. Eat
them, fish. Eat them.
Please eat them.
[41] How fresh they are and you down there six hundred feet in
that cold water in the
dark. Make another turn in the dark and co me back and eat
them. He felt the light
delicate pulling and then a harder pull when a sardine’s
head must have been more
difficult to break from the hook. Then there was nothing.
“Come on,” the old man said aloud. “Make
another turn. Just smell them. Aren’t they
lovely? Eat them good now and then there is the tuna. Hard
and cold and lovely. Don’t
be
shy, fish. Eat them.”
He waited with the line between his thumb and his finger,
watching it and the other
lines at the same time for the fish might have swum up or
down. Then came the same
delicate pulling touch again.
“He’ll take it,” the old man said al oud. “God help him to
take it.”
He did not take it though. He was gone and the old man felt
nothing.
“He can’t have gone,” he said. “Christ knows he can’t have
gone. He’s making a turn.
Maybe he
has been hooked before and he remembers something of it.
[42] Then he felt the gentle touch on the line and he was
happy.
“It was only his turn,” he said. “He’ll take
it.”
He was happy feeling the gentle pulling and then he
felt something hard and
unbelievably heavy. It was the weight of the fish and he let
the line slip down, down,
down, unrolling off the first of the two reserv e coils. As it
went down, slipping lightly
through the old man’s fingers, he still could fe el the great
weight, though the pressure of
his thumb and finger were almost impercep tible. “What a
fish,” he said. “He has it
sideways in his mouth now and he is moving off with it.”
Then he will turn and swallow it, he though t. He did not say
th at because he knew
that if you said a good thing it might not
happen. He knew wh at a huge fish this was
and
he thought of him moving away in the dark ness with the tuna
held crosswise in his
mouth. At that moment he felt him stop moving but the weig ht
was still there. Then the
weight increased and he gave more line. He tightened the
pressure of his thumb and
finger for a moment and the weight in creased and was going
straight down.
[43] “He’s taken it,” he said. “Now I’ll let him eat it well.”
He let the line slip through his fingers while he reached down
with his left hand and
made fast the free end of the two reserve coils to the loop of
the two reserve coils of the
next line. Now he was ready. He had three
forty-fathom coils of line in reserve now,
as
The Old Man and the Sea
- 16 -
well as the coil he was using.
“Eat it a little more,” he said. “Eat it well.”
Eat it so that the point of the hook goes into your heart and
kills you, he thought.
Come up easy and let me put the harpoon into you. All right.
Ar e you ready? Have you
been long enough at table?
“Now!” he said aloud and struck hard with
both hands, gained a yard of line
and
then struck again and again, swinging with ea ch arm
alternately on the cord with all
the
strength of his arms and the pivoted weight
of his body.
Nothing happened. The fish just moved away slowly and the old
man could not raise
him an inch. His line was strong and made for heavy fish and
he held it against his
hack
until it was so taut that beads of water were jumping from it.
Then it began to make a
slow hissing sound in the water and he still held it, bracing
[44] himself against the
thwart and leaning back against the pull. The boat began to
move slowly off toward the
north-west.
The fish moved steadily and they travelled sl owly on the calm
water. The other baits
were still in the water but there was nothing to be done.
“I wish I had the boy” the old man said alou d. “I’m being
towed by a fish and I’m the
towing bitt. I could make the line fast. But then he coul d
break it. I must hold him all I
can and give him line when he must have it. Thank God he is
travelling and not going
down.”
What I will do if he decides to go down, I don’t know. What
I’ll do if he sounds and
dies I don’t know. But I’ll do something.
There are plenty of things I can do.
He held the line against his back and wa tched its slant in
the water and the skiff
moving steadily to the north-west.
This will kill him, the old man thought. He
can’t do this forever. But four hours later
the fish was still swimming steadily out to sea, towing the
skiff, and the old man was still
braced solidly with the line across his back.
[45] “It was noon when I hooked him,” he
said. “And I have never seen him.”
He had pushed his straw hat hard down on his head before he
hook ed the fish and it
was cutting his forehead. He was thirsty too and he got down
on his knees and, being
careful not to jerk on the line, moved as far into the bow as
he could get and reached the
water bottle with one hand. He opened it and
drank a little. Then he rested against
the
bow. He rested sitting on the un-stepped mast and sail an d
tried not to think but only to
endure.
Then he looked behind him and saw that no
land was visible. That makes no
difference, he thought. I can always come in on the glow from
Havana. There are two
more hours before the sun sets and maybe he will come up
before that. If he
doesn’t
maybe he will come up with the moon. If he does not do that
maybe he will come up with
the sunrise. I have no cramps and I feel strong. It is he that
has th e hook in his mouth.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 17 -
But what a fish to pull like that. He must have his mouth shut
tight on the wire. I wish I
could see him. I wish I could see him only
once to know what I have against me.
The fish never changed his course nor his direction [46] all
that night as far as the
man could tell from watching the stars. It was cold after th e
sun went down and the old
man’s sweat dried cold on his back and his arms and his old
legs. During the day he
had
taken the sack that covered the bait box and
spread it in the sun to dry. After the
sun
went down he tied it around his neck so that
it hung down over his back and he
cautiously worked it down un der the line that was across
his shoulders now. The
sack
cushioned the line and he had found a way of
leaning forward against the bow so that
he
was almost comfortable. The position actually was only
somewhat less intolerable; but he
thought of it as al most comfortable.
I can do nothing with him and he can do nothing with me, he
thought. Not as long as
he keeps this up.
Once he stood up and urinated over the side of the skiff and
looked at the stars and
checked his course. The line showed like a ph osphorescent
streak in the water straight
out from his shoulders. They were moving more slowly now
and the glow of Havana
was
not so strong, so that he knew the current must
be carrying them to the eastward. If I
lose
the glare of Havana we must be going more to the eastward, he
thought. For if the fish’s
course held true I must see it for many more [47] hours. I
wonder how the baseball came
out in the grand leagues today, he thought.
It would be wonder ful to do this with a
radio.
Then he thought, think of it always. Think of what you are
doing. You must do nothing
stupid.
Then he said aloud, “I wish I had the boy. To help me and to
see this.”
No one should be alone in their old age, he thought. But
it is unavoidable. I must
remember to eat the tuna before he spoils in
order to keep strong. Remember, no
matter
how little you want to, that you must eat
him in the morning. Remember, he said to
himself.
During the night two porpoises came around
the boat and he could hear them
rolling
and blowing. He could tell the difference between the blowing
noise the male made and
the sighing blow of the female.
“They are good,” he said. “T hey play and make jokes and love
one another. They are
our brothers like the flying fish.”
Then he began to pity the great fish that he
had hooked. He is wonderful and strange
and who knows how old he is, he thought. Ne ver have I had
such a strong fish nor
one
who acted so strangely. Perhaps he is too wise to jump. He
could ruin me by jumping or
[48] by a wild rush. But perhaps he has been hooked many
times before and he knows
that this is how he should make his fight. He
cannot know that it is only one
man against
him, nor that it is an old man. But what a
great fish he is and what will he bring in
the
market if the flesh is good. He took the bait like a male an d
he pulls like a male and his
fight has no panic in it. I wonder if he has any plans or if
he is just as desperate as I am?
He remembered the time he had hooked one of a pair of marlin.
The male fish
The Old Man and the Sea
- 18 -
always let the female fish feed first and
the hooked fish, the female,
made a wild,
panic-stricken, despairing figh t that soon exhausted her, and
all the time the male had
stayed with her, crossing the line and circling with her on
the surface. He had stayed so
close that the old man was afraid he would
cut the line with his tail which was sharp as
a
scythe and almost of that size and shape. When the old man had
gaffed her and clubbed
her, holding the rapier bill with its sandpape r edge and
dubbing her across the top of
her
head until her colour turned to a colour
almost like the back ing of mirrors, and then,
with
the boy’s aid, hoisted her aboard, the male fish had stayed by
the side of the boat. Then,
while the old man was clearing the lines and preparing the
harpoon, [49] the male
fish
jumped high into the air beside the boat to
see where the fe male was and then went
down
deep, his lavender wings, that were his pectoral fins, spread
wide and all his wide
lavender stripes showing. He was beautiful,
the old man remembered, and he
had stayed.
That was the saddest thing I ever saw with
them, the ol d man thought. The boy was
sad too and we begged her pardon and butchered her promptly.
“I wish the boy was here,” he said aloud and settled himself
against the rounded
planks of the bow and felt the strength of the great fish
through the line he he ld across his
shoulders moving steadily toward whatever he had chosen.
When once, through my treachery, it had been
necessary to him to make a choice,
the old man thought.
His choice had been to stay in the deep dark water far out
beyond all snares and
traps and treacheries. My choice was to go th ere to find him
beyond all people. Beyond all
people in the world. Now we ar e joined together and have be
en since noon. And no one to
help either one of us.
Perhaps I should not have been a fisherman, he thought.
But that was the thing
that
I was born for. I must sure ly remember to eat the tuna after
it gets light.
[50] Some time before daylight something
took one of the baits that were
behind
him. He heard the stick break and the line begi n to rush out
over the gunwale of the
skiff.
In the darkness he loosened his sheath knife
and taking all the strain of
the fish on his
left shoulder he leaned back and cut the line against the wood
of the gunwale. Then he
cut the other line closest to him and in the dark made the
loose ends of the reserve coils
fast. He worked skillfully with the one hand
and put his foot on the coils to hold them
as
he drew his knots tight. Now he had six reserve coils of line.
There we re two from each
bait he had severed and the two from the bait the fish had
taken and they were all
connected.
After it is light, he thought, I will work back to the
forty-fathom bait and cut it away
too and link up the reserve co ils. I will have lost two hund
red fathoms of good Catalan
cardel and the hooks and leaders. That can be replaced. But
who repl aces this fish if I
hook some fish and it cuts him off?
I don’t know what that fish was that took
the bait just now. It could have been
a
marlin or a broadbill or a shark. I never felt him. I had to
get rid of him too fast.
Aloud he said, “I wish I had the boy.”
The Old Man and the Sea
- 19 -
[51] But you haven’t got the boy, he thou ght. You have only
yourself and you had
better work back to the last line now, in the dark or not in
the dark, and cut it away and
hook up the two reserve coils.
So he did it. It was difficult in the dark and once the fi sh
made a surge that pulled
him down on his face and made a cut below his eye. The blood
ran down his cheek a
little
way. But it coagulated and dried before it reached his chin
and he worked his way back to
the bow and rested against the wood. He adjusted the sack and
carefully worked the line
so that it came across a new part of his
shoulders and, holding it anchored with
his
shoulders, he carefully felt the pull of the fish and then
felt with his hand the progress of
the skiff through the water.
I wonder what he made that lurch for, he
thought. The wi re must have slipped on the
great hill of his back. Certainly his back cannot
feel as badly as mine does. But
he cannot
pull this skiff forever, no matter how great
he is. Now everything is cleared away
that
might make trouble and I have a big rese rve of line; all that
a man can ask.
“Fish,” he said softly, aloud, “I’ ll stay with you until I am
dead.”
[52] He’ll stay with me too, I suppose, the
old man thought and he waited
for it to be
light. It was cold now in the time before
daylight and he pu shed against the wood to
be
warm. I can do it as long as he can, he thought. And in the
first light the line extended out
and down into the water. The boat moved steadily and when the
first edge of the sun rose
it was on the old man’s right shoulder.
“He’s headed north,” the old man said. The current will have
set us far to the
eastward, he thought. I wish he would turn
with the current. That would show that
he
was tiring.
When the sun had risen further the old man realized that the
fish was not tiring.
There was only one favorable sign. The slant
of the line showed he was swimming at
a
lesser depth. That did not necessarily me an that he would
jump. But he might.
“God let him jump,” the old man said. “I
have enough line to handle him.”
Maybe if I can increase the tension just a little it will hurt
him and he will jump, he
thought. Now that it is daylight let him
jump so that he’ll fill the sacks along his
backbone
with air and then he cannot go deep to die.
[53] He tried to increase the tension, but
the line had been taut up to the very edge
of
the breaking point since he had hooked the fish and he felt
the harshness as he
leaned
back to pull and knew he could put no more strain on it. I
must not jerk it ever, he
thought. Each jerk widens th e cut the hook makes and then
when he does jump he
might
throw it. Anyway I feel better with the sun an d for once I do
not have to look into it.
There was yellow weed on the line but the old man knew that
only made an added
drag and he was pleased. It was the ye llow Gulf weed that had
made so much
phosphorescence in the night.
“Fish,” he said, “I love you and respect you
very much. But I will kill you dead before
this day ends.”
The Old Man and the Sea
- 20 -
Let us hope so, he thought.
A small bird came toward the skiff from the north. He was a
warbler and flying very
low over
the water. The old man could see that he wa s very tired. The
bird made the stern of
the boat and rested there. Then he flew arou nd the old man’s
head and rested on the line
where he was more comfortable. “How old are you?” the old
man asked the bird. “Is
this
your first trip?”
[54] The bird looked at him when he spoke. He was too tired
even to examine the
line and he teetered on it as his delicate feet gripped it
fast.
“It’s steady,” the old man told him. “It’s to o steady. You
shouldn’t be that tired after
a windless night. What are birds coming to?”
The hawks, he thought, that come out to sea
to meet them. But he said nothing of
this to the bird who could not understand him anyway and who
would learn about the
hawks soon enough.
“Take a good rest, small bird,” he said. “Then go in and take
your chance like any
man or bird or fish.”
It encouraged him to talk be cause his back had stiffened in
the night and it hurt truly
now.
“Stay at my house if you like , bird,” he said. “I am sorry I
cannot hoist the sail and
take you in with the small breeze that is
rising. But I am with a friend.”
Just then the fish gave a sudden lurch that pulled the old man
down onto the bow
and would have pulled him overboard if he h ad not braced
himself and given some line.
The bird had flown up when the line jerked and the old man had
not even seen him
go. He felt the line [55] carefully with his right hand and no
ticed his hand was bleeding.
“Something hurt him then,” he said aloud and pulled back
on the line to see if he
could turn the fish. But when he was
touching the breaking point he held steady
and
settled back against the strain of the line.
“You’re feeling it now, fish,” he said. “And
so, God knows, am I.”
He looked around for the bird now because he would have liked
him for company.
The bird was gone.
You did not stay long, the man thought. But it is rougher
where you are going until
you make the shore. How did I let the fish cu t me with that
one qu ick pull he made? I
must be getting very stupid. Or perhaps I
was looking at th e small bird and thinking
of
him. Now I will pay attention to my work and then I must eat
the tuna so that I will not
have a failure of strength.
“I wish the boy were here and that I had some salt,” he said
aloud.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 21 -
Shifting the weight of the line to his left
shoulder and kneeling carefully he
washed
his hand in the ocean and held it there, subm erged, for more
than a [56] minute watching
the blood trail away and the steady movement of the water
against his hand as the boat
moved.
“He has slowed much,” he said.
The old man would have liked to keep his hand in the salt
water longer but he was
afraid of another sudden lurch by the fish and he stood up and
braced himself and held
his hand up against the sun. It was only a
line burn that h ad cut his flesh. But it was
in
the working part of his hand. He knew he would need his hands
before this was over and
he did not like to be cu t before it started.
“Now,” he said, when his hand had dried, “I must eat the small
tuna. I can reach him
with the gaff and eat him here in comfort.”
He knelt down and found the tuna under the stem with the gaff
and drew it toward
him keeping it clear of the coiled lines. Holdin g the line
with his left shoulder again, and
bracing on his left hand and ar m, he took the tuna off the
gaff hook and put the gaff back
in place. He put one knee on the fish and cu t strips of dark
red meat longitudinally from
the back of the head to the tail. They were we dge-shaped
strips and he cut [57] them from
next to the back bone down to the edge of th e belly. When he
had cu t six strips he spread
them out on the wood of the bo w, wiped his knife on his
trouse rs, and lifted the carcass of
the bonito by the tail and dropped it overboard.
“I don’t think I can eat an entire one,” he said and drew his
knife across one of the
strips. He could feel the steady hard pull of the line and hi
s left hand was cramped. It
drew up tight on the heavy cord and he looked at it in
disgust.
“What kind of a hand is that,” he said. “Cra mp then if you
want. Make yourself into a
claw. It will do you no good.”
Come on, he thought and looked down into the
dark water at the slant of the line.
Eat it now and it will strengthen the hand. It is not the
hand’s fault and you have been
many hours with the fish. But you can stay with him forever.
Eat the bonito now.
He picked up a piece and put it in his mouth and chewed it
slowly. It was not
unpleasant.
Chew it well, he thought, and get all the juices. It would not
be had to eat with a little
lime or with lemon or with salt.
“How do you feel, hand?” he asked the crampe d [58] hand that
was almost as stiff as
rigor mortis. “I’ll eat some more for you.”
He ate the other part of the piece that he had cut in two. He
chewed it carefully and
then spat out the skin.
“How does it go, hand? Or is it too early to know?”
He took another full piece and chewed it.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 22 -
“It is a strong full-blooded fish,” he
thought. “I was lucky to get him instead
of
dolphin. Dolphin is too sweet. This is hardly sweet at all and
all the strength is still in it.”
There is no sense in being anything but practical though, he
thought. I wish I had
some salt. And I do not know whether the sun
will rot or dr y what is left, so I had
better
eat it all although I am not hungry. The fish is calm and
steady. I will eat it all and then I
will be ready.
“Be patient, hand,” he said. “I do this for you.”
I wish I could feed th e fish, he thought. He is my br other.
But I must kill him and
keep strong to do it. Slowly and conscientiously he ate all of
the wedge-shaped strips of
fish.
He straightened up, wiping his hand on his trousers. “Now ,”
he said. “You can let the
cord go, hand, and I will handle him with th e right arm alone
until you [59] stop that
nonsense.” He put his left foot on the heavy line that the
left hand had held and lay
back
against the pull against his back.
“God help me to have the cramp go,” he said.
“Because I do not know what the fish
is
going to do.”
But he seems calm, he thought, and following his plan.
But what is his plan, he
thought. And what is mine? Mine I must improv ise to his
because of his great size. If he
will jump I can kill him. But he stays down forever. Then I
will stay down with him
forever.
He rubbed the cramped hand against his trousers and tried to
gentle the fingers. But
it would not open. Maybe it wi ll open with the sun, he thou
ght. Maybe it will open when
the strong raw tuna is digested. If I have to ha ve it, I will
open it, cost whatever it costs.
But I do not want to open it no w by force. Let it open by
itself and come back of its own
accord. After all I abused it mu ch in the night when it was
necessary to free and untie the
various lines.
He looked across the sea and knew how alone he was now. But he
could see the
prisms in the deep dark water and the line stretching ahead
and th e strange undulation
of the calm. The clouds were building up now for the trade
wind and he looked ahead and
saw a [60] flight of wild ducks etching themselves against the
sky over the water, then
blurring, then etching again and he knew no man was ever alone
on the sea.
He thought of how some men feared being out of sight of land
in a small boar and
knew they were right in the months of sudden
bad weather. But now they were in
hurricane months and, when there are no hurr icanes, the
weather of hurricane months
is
the best of all the year.
If there is a hurricane you always see the signs of it in the
sky for days ahead, if you
are at sea. They do not see it ashore becaus e they do not
know wh at to look for, he
thought. The land must make a difference too, in the shape of
the clouds. But we have no
hurricane coming now.
He looked at the sky and saw the white cumulus built like
friendly piles of ice cream
The Old Man and the Sea
- 23 -
and high above were the thin feathers of the cirrus against
the high September sky.
“Light brisa,” he said. “Better weather for
me than for you, fish.”
His left hand was still cramped, but he was unknotting it
slowly.
I hate a cramp, he thought. It is a treachery of one’s [61]
own body. It is
humiliating
before others to have a diarrhoea from ptomaine poisoning or
to vomit from it. But a
cramp, he thought of it as a calambre, humili ates oneself
especially when one is alone.
If the boy were here he could rub it for me and loosen it down
from the forearm, he
thought. But it will loosen up.
Then, with his right hand he felt the difference in the pull
of th e line before he saw
the slant change in the water. Then, as he
leaned against the line and slapped his
left
hand hard and fast against his thigh he saw
the line slanting slowly upward.
“He’s coming up,” he said. “Come on hand. Please come on.”
The line rose slowly and steadily and then
the surface of the ocean bulged ahead
of
the boat and the fish came out. He came out
unendingly and water po ured from his
sides.
He was bright in the sun and his head and back were dark
purple and in the sun the
stripes on his sides showed wide and a light
lavender. His sword was as long as a
baseball
bat and tapered like a rapier and he rose
his full length from the water and
then
re-entered it, smoothly, like a diver and the
old [62] man saw the gr eat scythe-blade
of
his tail go under and the line commenced to race out.
“He is two feet longer than the skiff,” the old man said. The
line was going out fast
but steadily and the fish was not panicked. The old man was
trying with both hands to
keep the line just inside of breaking strength. He knew that
if he could not slow the fish
with a steady pressure the fish could take out all the li ne
and break it.
He is a great fish and I must convince him,
he thought. I must never let
him learn his
strength nor what he could do if he made his
run. If I were him I would put in
everything
now and go until something brok e. But, thank God, they are
not as intelligent as we who
kill them; although they are more noble and more able.
The old man had seen many great fish. He had seen many that
weighed more than a
thousand pounds and he had ca ught two of that size in his
life, but never alone. Now
alone, and out of sight of land , he was fast to the biggest
fi sh that he had ever seen
and
bigger than he had ever heard of, and his left hand was still
as tight as the gripped claws
of an eagle.
[63] It will uncramp though, he thought. Surely it will
uncramp to help my right
hand. There are three things that are brothe rs: the fish and
my two hands. It must
uncramp. It is unworthy of it to be cramped.
The fish had slowed again and was going at
his usual pace.
I wonder why he jumped, the old man thought. He jumped almost
as though to show
me how big he was. I know now, anyway, he thought. I wish I
could show him what sort
of man I am. But then he would see the cramped hand. Let him
think I am more man
The Old Man and the Sea
- 24 -
than I am and I will be so. I wish I was the
fish, he thou ght, with everything he has
He settled comfortably against the wood and
took his suff ering as it came and the
fish swam steadily and the boat moved slowly through the dark
water. There was a small
sea rising with the wind coming up from the east and at noon
the old man’s left hand was
uncramped.
“Bad news for you, fish,” he said and
shifted the line over the sacks that covered
his
shoulders.
He was comfortable but suffering, although he did not admit
the suffering at all.
“I am not religious,” he said. “But I will
say ten Our [64] Fathers and ten Hail
Marys
that I should catch this fish, and I promise to make a
pilgrimage to the Virgin of Cobre if I
catch him. That is a promise.”
He commenced to say his prayers mechanically. Sometimes he
would be so tired that
he could not remember the pray er and then he would say them
fast so that they would
come automatically. Hail Ma rys are easier to say than Our
Fathers, he thought.
“Hail Mary full of Grace the Lord is wi th thee. Blessed art
thou among women and
blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of
God, pray for us sinners
now and at the hour of our de ath. Amen.” Then he added,
“Blessed Virgin, pray for
the
death of this fish. Wonderful though he is.”
With his prayers said, and feeling much better, but suffering
exactly as much, and
perhaps a little more, he leaned against the wo od of the bow
and began, mechanically, to
work the fingers of his left hand.
The sun was hot now although the breeze was rising gently.
“I had better re-bait that little line out over the stern,” he
said. “I f the fish decides to
stay another night I will need to eat again and
the water is low in the bottle. I don’t
think
I can get anything but a dolphin [65] here. But if I eat him
fresh en ough he won’t be bad.
I wish a flying fish would come on board toni ght. But I have
no light to attract them. A
flying fish is excellent to eat raw and I woul d not have to
cut him up. I must save all my
strength now. Christ, I did not know he was
so big.”
“I’ll kill him though,” he said. “I n all his greatness and
his glory.”
Although it is unjust, he th ought. But I will show him what a
man can do and what a
man endures.
“I told the boy I was a st range old man,” he said.
“Now is when I must prove it.”
The thousand times that he had proved it meant nothing. Now he
was proving it
again. Each time was a new time and he never thought about the
past when he was doing
it.
against only my will and my intelligence.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 25 -
I wish he’d sleep and I could sleep and dr eam about the
lions, he thought. Why are
the lions the main thing that is left? Don’t thin k, old man,
he said to himself, Rest gently
now against the wood and think of nothing. He is working.
Work as little as you can.
It was getting into the afternoon and the boat still moved
slowly and steadily. But
there was an added drag now from the easterly breeze and the
old man [66] rode gently
with the small sea and the hurt of the cord across his back
came to him easily and
smoothly.
Once in the afternoon the line started to rise again. But the
fish only continued to
swim at a slightly higher level. The sun was on the old man’s
left arm and shoulder and
on his back. So he knew the fish had turned east of north.
Now that he had seen him once, he could picture the fi sh
swimming in the water
with his purple pectoral fins set wide as
wings and the great erect tail slicing through
the
dark. I wonder how much he sees at that depth, the old man
thought. His eye is huge and
a horse, with much less eye, can see in the dark. Once I could
see quite well in the dark.
Not in the absolute dark. But almost as a cat sees.
The sun and his steady movement of his
fingers had uncramped his left
hand now
completely and he began to shift more of the st rain to it and
he sh rugged the muscles of
his back to shift the hurt of the cord a little.
“If you’re not tired, fish,” he said aloud, “you must
be very strange.”
He felt very tired now and he knew the night would come soon
and he tried to think
of other things. He thought of the Big Leagues,
to him they were the Gran [67] Ligas,
and
he knew that the Yankees of New York were playing the Tigres
of Detroit.
This is the second day now that I do not kn ow the result of
the juegos, he thought.
But I must have confidence and I must be
worthy of the great DiMaggio who does
all
things perfectly even with the pain of the bone
spur in his heel. What is a bone spur?
he
asked himself. Un espuela de hueso. We do not have them. Can
it be as painful as the
spur of a fighting cock in one’s heel? I do no t think I could
endure that or the loss of the
eye and of both eyes and cont inue to fight as the fighting
cocks do. Man is not much
beside the great birds and beasts. Still I woul d rather be
that beast down there in the
darkness of the sea.
“Unless sharks come,” he said aloud. “If sharks come, God pity
him and me.”
Do you believe the great DiMaggio would stay
with a fish as long as I will stay
with
this one? he thought. I am su re he would and more since he
is young and strong. Also
his
father was a fisherman. But would the bone spur hurt him too
much?
“I do not know,” he said alou d. “I never had a bone spur.”
As the sun set he remembered, to give
himself more [68] confidence, the time in
the
tavern at Casablanca when he had played the
hand game with the great negro
from
Cienfuegos who was the strongest man on the docks. They
had gone one day and one
night with their elbows on a chalk line on the table and their
forearms straight up and
their hands gripped tight. Each one was trying to force the
other’s hand down onto the
The Old Man and the Sea
- 26 -
table. There was much bettin g and people went in and
out of the room under the
kerosene lights and he had looked at the ar m and hand of the
negro and at the negro’s
face. They changed the referees every four
hours after the first eight so that the
referees
could sleep. Blood came out from under the fingernails of both
his and the negro’s hands
and they looked each other in the eye and at
their hands and forearms and the
bettors
went in and out of the room and sat on high chairs against the
wall and watched. The
walls were painted bright blue and were of
wood and the lamps threw their shadows
against them. The negro’s shadow was huge and it moved on the
wall as the breeze
moved the lamps.
The odds would change back and forth all night and they fed
the negro rum and
lighted cigarettes for him.
Then the negro, after the rum, would try fo r a tremendous
[69] effort and once he
had the old man, who was not an old man th en but was Santiago
El Campeon, nearly
three inches off balance. But the old man
had raised his hand up to dead even again.
He
was sure then that he had the negro, who was a fine man and a
great athlete, beaten. And
at daylight when the bettors were asking that it be called a
draw and the referee was
shaking his head, he had unleashed his effort and forced the
hand of the negro down and
down until it rested on the wood. The matc h had started on a
Sun day morning and ended
on a Monday morning. Many of the bettors ha d asked for a draw
because they had to go
to work on the docks loading sacks of sugar or at the Havana
Coal Company. Otherwise
everyone would have wanted it to go to a fini sh. But he had
finished it anyway and before
anyone had to go to work.
For a long time after that everyone ha d called him The
Champion and there had
been a return match in the spring. But not much money was
bet and he had won it
quite
easily since he had broken the confidence of the negro from Ci
enfuegos in the first match.
After that he had a few matches and then no
more. He decided that he could beat
anyone
if he wanted to badly enough and he decided
that it was bad for his right [70] hand for
fishing. He had tried a few practice matches
with his left hand. But his left hand
had
always been a traitor and would not do what he called on it to
do and he did not trust it.
The sun will bake it out well now, he thought. It should not
cramp on me again
unless it gets too cold in the night. I
wonder what this night will bring.
An airplane passed overhead on its cour se to Miami and he
watched its shadow
scaring up the schools of flying fish.
“With so much flying fish there should be dolphin,” he said,
and leaned back on the
line to see if it was possible to gain any
on his fish. But he could not and it stayed at
the
hardness and water-drop shivering that prec eded breaking. The
boat moved ahead slowly
and he watched the airplane until he could no longer see it.
It must be very strange in an airplane, he
thought. I wonder what the sea looks like
from that height? They should be able to see the fish well if
they do not fly too high. I
would like to fly very slowly at two hundred fathoms high and
see the fish from above. In
the turtle boats I was in the cross-trees of
the mast-head and even at that height I saw
much. The dolphin look greener from there and you can see
their stripes and their purple
The Old Man and the Sea
- 27 -
[71] spots and you can see all of the school
as they swim. Why is it that all the
fast-moving
fish of the dark current have purple backs
and usually pu rple stripes or spots? The
dolphin looks green of course because he is
really golden. But when he comes to
feed,
truly hungry, purple stripes sh ow on his sides as on a
marlin. Can it be anger, or the
greater speed he makes that brings them out?
Just before it was dark, as they passed a great island of
Sargasso weed that heaved
and swung in the light sea as though the ocean were making
love wi th something under a
yellow blanket, his small line wa s taken by a dolphin. He saw
it first when it jumped in
the air, true gold in the last of the sun an d bending and
flapping wildly in the air.
It
jumped again and again in the acrobatics of its fear and he
worked his way back to
the
stern and crouching and holding the big line with his right
hand and arm, he pulled the
dolphin in with his left hand, st epping on the gained line
each time with his bare left foot.
When the fish was at the stem, plunging and cutting from side
to side in desperation,
the
old man leaned over the stern and lifted the bu rnished gold
fish with its purple spots over
the stem. Its jaws were workin g convulsively in quick bites
against [72] the hook and
it
pounded the bottom of the skiff with its long flat body, its
tail and its head until he
clubbed it across the shining golden head until it shivered
and was still.
The old man unhooked the fish, re-baited the line with another
sardine and tossed it
over. Then he worked his way slowly back to
the bow. He washed his left hand and
wiped
it on his trousers. Then he shifted the
heavy line from hi s right hand to his left
and
washed his right hand in the sea while he watched the sun go
into the ocean and the
slant
of the big cord.
“He hasn’t changed at all,” he said. But watching the mo
vement of the water against
his hand he noted that it was perceptibly slower.
“I’ll lash the two oars together across the
stern and that will slow him in the
night,”
he said. “He’s good for the night and so am I.”
It would be better to gut the dolphin a litt le later to save
the blood in the meat, he
thought. I can do that a little later and lash
the oars to make a drag at the
same time. I
had better keep the fish quiet now and not disturb him too
much at sunset. The setting of
the sun is a difficult time for all fish. He let his hand dry
in the air then grasped the line
[73] with it and eased himself as much as he
could and allowed himself to be pulled
forward against the wood so that the boat took
the strain as much, or more,
than he did.
I’m learning how to do it, he thought. This part of it anyway.
Then too, remember he
hasn’t eaten since he took the bait and he is huge and need s
much food. I have eaten the
whole bonito. Tomorrow I will eat the dolphin.
He called it dorado. Perhaps I should
eat
some of it when I clean it. It will be
harder to eat than the bonito. But, then, nothing
is
easy.
“How do you feel, fish?” he asked aloud. “I feel good and my
left hand is better and I
have food for a night and a day. Pull the
boat, fish.”
He did not truly feel good because the pain from the cord
across his back had almost
passed pain and gone into a dullness that he mistrusted. But I
ha ve had worse things
than that, he thought. My hand is only cut a little and the
cramp is gone from the other.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 28 -
My legs are all right. Also now I have gained on him in the
question of sustenance.
It was dark now as it becomes dark quickly after the sun
sets in September. He lay
against the worn wood of the bow and rested all that he could.
The first stars [74] were
out. He did not know the name of Rigel but
he saw it and knew soon they would all be
out
and he would have all his distant friends.
“The fish is my friend too,” he said aloud.
“I have never seen or heard of such a
fish.
But I must kill him. I am glad we do not have to try to kill
the stars.”
Imagine if each day a man must try to ki ll the moon, he
thought. The moon runs
away. But imagine if a man each day should
have to try to kill the sun? We were
born
lucky, he thought.
Then he was sorry for the great fish that had nothing to eat
and his determination to
kill him never relaxed in his so rrow for him. How many people
will he feed, he thought.
But are they worthy to eat him? No, of course not. There is no
one worthy of eating him
from the manner of his behaviour and his great dignity.
I do not understand these thin gs, he thought. But it is good
that we do not have to
try to kill the sun or the moon or the
stars. It is enough to live on the sea and kill
our true
brothers.
Now, he thought, I must think about the drag. It has its
perils and its merits. I
may
lose so much line that I will lose him, if he
makes his effort and the drag [75] made by
the
oars is in place and the boat loses all her
lightness. Her lightness prolongs both
our
suffering but it is my safety since he has
great speed that he has never yet employed.
No
matter what passes I must gut the dolphin so he does not spoi
l and eat some of him to be
strong.
Now I will rest an hour more and feel that he is solid and
steady before I move back
to the stern to do the work and make the
decision. In the meantime I can see how he
acts
and if he shows any changes. The oars are a good trick; but it
has reached the time to
play
for safety. He is much fish still and I saw th at the hook was
in the corner of his mouth
and he has kept his mouth tight shut. The
punishment of the h ook is nothing.
The
punishment of hunger, and that he is agains t something that
he does not comprehend, is
everything. Rest now, old man, and let him work until your
next duty comes.
He rested for what he believed to be two hours. The moon did
no t rise now until late
and he had no way of judging the time. Nor was he really
resting except comparatively.
He was still bearing the pull of the fish across his shoulders
but he placed his left hand
on
the [76] gunwale of the bow and confided more and more of the
resistance to the fish to
the skiff itself.
How simple it would be if I could make the line fast, he
thought. But with one small
lurch he could break it. I must cushion the pull
of the line with my body and at all
times
be ready to give line with both hands.
“But you have not slept yet, old man,” he
said aloud. “It is half a day and a night
and
now another day and you have not slept. You must devise a way
so that you sleep a little if
The Old Man and the Sea
- 29 -
he is quiet and steady. If you do not slee p you might become
unclear in the head.”
I’m clear enough in the head, he thought. Too clear. I am as
clear as the stars that are
my brothers. Still I must sleep. They sleep and the moon and
the sun sleep and even the
ocean sleeps sometimes on certain days when there is no
current and a flat calm.
But remember to sleep, he thought. Make yourself do it and
devise some simple and
sure way about the lines. Now go back and
prepare the dolphin. It is too dangerous to
rig
the oars as a drag if you must sleep.
I could go without sleeping, he told hims elf. But it would be
too dangerous.
[77] He started to work his way back to the
stern on his hands and knees, being
careful not to jerk against the fish. He may
be half asleep hi mself, he thought. But I
do
not want him to rest. He must pull until he
dies.
Back in the stern he turned so that his left hand held the
strain of the line across his
shoulders and drew his knife from its sheath
with his right hand. The stars were
bright
now and he saw the dolphin clearly and he pushed the blade of
his knife into his head
and drew him out from under the stern. He put one of his feet
on the fish and slit him
quickly from the vent up to the tip of his lower jaw. Then he
put his knife down and
gutted him with his right hand, scooping him clean and pulling
the gills clear.
He felt the maw heavy and slippery in his
hands and he slit it open. There were
two
flying fish inside. They were fresh and hard
and he laid them side by side
and dropped
the guts and the gills over the stern. They sa nk leaving a
trail of phosphorescence in the
water. The dolphin was cold and a leprous gray-white now in
the starlight and the old
man skinned one side of him while he held his right foot on
the fish’s head. Then he
turned him over and skinned the other side and cut each side
off from the head down to
the tail.
[78] He slid the carcass overboard and looked to see if there
was any swirl in the
water. But there was only the light of its slow
descent. He turned then and placed the
two
flying fish inside the two fillets of fish and putting his kn
ife back in its sheath, he worked
his way slowly back to the bow. His back was bent with the
weight of the line across it and
he carried the fish in his right hand.
Back in the bow he laid the two fillets of
fish out on the wood with the flying
fish
beside them. After that he settled the line ac ross his
shoulders in a new place and held it
again with his left hand resting on the gunwale. Then he
leaned over the side and washed
the flying fish in the water, noting the speed of the water
against his hand. His hand was
phosphorescent from skinning the fish and he
watched the flow of the water against
it.
The flow was less strong and as he rubbed
the side of his hand against the planking of
the
skiff, particles of phosphorus floated off and drifted slowly
astern.
“He is tiring or he is restin g,” the old man said. “Now let
me get through the eating of
this dolphin and get some rest and a little sleep.”
Under the stars and with the night colder all the [79] time he
ate half of one of the
dolphin fillets and one of the flying fish, gutted and
with its head cut off.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 30 -
“What an excellent fish dolphin is to eat cooked,” he said.
“And what a miserable
fish
raw. I will never go in a boat again without
salt or limes.”
If I had brains I would have splashed water on the bow all day
and drying, it would
have made salt, he thought. But then I did not hook the
dolphin until almost sunset. Still
it was a lack of preparation. But I have chewed it all well
and I am not nauseated.
The sky was clouding over to the east and
one after another the stars he knew
were
gone. It looked now as though he were moving
into a great canyon of clouds and the wind
had dropped.
“There will be bad weather in three or four days,” he said.
“But not tonight and not
tomorrow. Rig now to get some sleep, old ma n, while the fish
is calm and steady.”
He held the line tight in his right hand and then pushed his
thigh against his right
hand as he leaned all his weight against the
wood of the bow. Then he passed the line
a
little lower on his shoulders and braced his
left hand on it.
My right hand can hold it as long as it is braced, he [80]
thought If it relaxes in sleep
my left hand will wake me as th e line goes out. It is hard on
the right hand. But he is used
to punishment Even if I sleep twenty minutes or a half an ho
ur it is good. He lay forward
cramping himself against the line with all of
his body, putting all his
weight onto his right
band, and he was asleep.
He did not dream of the lions but instead of a vast school of
porpoises that stretched
for eight or ten miles and it wa s in the time of thei r
mating and they would leap high into
the air and return into the sa me hole they had made in the
water when they leaped.
Then he dreamed that he was in the vill age on his bed and th
ere was a norther and
he was very cold and his right arm was asleep because his head
had rested on it instead of
a pillow.
After that he began to dream of the long
yellow beach and he saw the first of
the
lions come down onto it in the early dark an d then the other
lions ca me and he rested his
chin on the wood of the bows where the sh ip lay anchored with
the evening off-shore
breeze and he waited to see if there would
be more lions and he was happy.
The moon had been up for a long time but he
slept [81] on and the fish pulled on
steadily and the boat moved in to the tunnel of clouds.
He woke with the jerk of his right fist coming up against his
face and the line burning
out through his right hand. He had no feeling of
his left hand but he braked all he
could
with his right and the line rush ed out. Finally his left hand
found the line and he
leaned
back against the line and now it burned his back and his left
hand, and his left hand was
taking all the strain and cutting badly. He looked back at the
coils of line and they were
feeding smoothly. Just then the fish jumped making a great
bursting of the ocean and
then a heavy fall. Then he jumped again and again and the boat
was going fast although
line was still racing out and the old man was raising the
strain to breaking point and
raising it to breaking point again and again. He had been
pulled down tight onto the bow
and his face was in the cut slice of dolphin
and he could not move.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 31 -
This is what we waited for, he thought. So
now let us take it. Make him pay for the
line, he thought. Make him pay for it.
He could not see the fish’s jumps but only heard the [82]
breaking of the ocean and
the heavy splash as he fell. The speed of the line was cutting
his hands badly but he
had
always known this would happen and he tried to keep the
cutting across the calloused
parts and not let the line slip into the
palm nor cut the fingers.
If the boy was here he would wet the coils of line, he
thought. Yes. If the boy were
here. If the boy were here.
The line went out and out an d out but it was slowing now
and he was making the
fish
earn each inch of it. Now he got his head up from the wood and
out of the slice of fish
that his cheek had crushed. Then he was on
his knees and then he rose slowly to his
feet.
He was ceding line but more slowly all he time. He worked
back to where he could
feel
with his foot the coils of line that he
could not see. There was plenty of line still and
now
the fish had to pull the friction of all
that new line through the water.
Yes, he thought. And now he has jumped more than a dozen times
and filled the
sacks along his back with air and he cannot go down deep to
die where I cannot bring
him up. He will start circling soon and then
I must work on him. I wonder what
started
him so suddenly? Could it have been hunger
that made him desperate, [83] or was
he
frightened by something in th e night? Maybe he suddenly felt
fear. But he was such a
calm, strong fish and he seemed so fearless and so confident.
It is strange.
“You better be fearless and confident yours elf, old man,” he
said. “You’re holding
him again but you cannot get line. But soon he has to circle.”
The old man held him with his left hand and
his shou lders now and stooped down
and scooped up water in his right hand to get the crushed
dolphin fles h off of his face. He
was afraid that it might nauseate him and he would vomit and
lose his strength. When
his face was cleaned he washed his right hand in the water
over the side and then let it
stay in the salt water while he watched the
first light come before the
sunrise. He’s
headed almost east, he thought. That means he is tired and
going with the current. Soon
he will have to circle. Then our true work begins.
After he judged that his right hand had been in the water long
enough he took it out
and looked at it.
“It is not bad,” he said. “And pain does not matter to a man.”
He took hold of the line carefully so that it did not fit into
any of the fresh line cuts
and shifted his weight [84] so that he could put his left hand
into the sea on the other
side of the skiff.
“You did not do so badly fo r something worthless,” he said to
his left hand. “But
there was a moment when I could not find
you.”
Why was I not born with two good hands? he thought. Perh aps
it was my fault in not
training that one properly. Bu t God knows he has had enough
chances to learn. He did
not do so badly in the night, though, and he
has only cramped once . If he cramps
again
The Old Man and the Sea
- 32 -
let the line cut him off.
When he thought that he knew that he was not being clea
r-headed and he thought he
should chew some more of the dolphin. But I
can’t, he told himself. It is
better to be
light-headed than to lose your strength from nausea. And I
know I cannot keep it if I eat
it since my face was in it. I will keep it for an
emergency until it goes ba d. But it is too
late
to try for strength now through nourishment.
You’re stupid, he told himself.
Eat the other
flying fish.
It was there, cleaned and ready, and he
picked it up with his left hand and ate
it
chewing the bones carefully and eating all of it down to the
tail.
It has more nourishment than almost any fish, he [85] thought.
At least the kind of
strength that I need. Now I have done what I can, he thought.
Let him begin to circle and
let the fight come.
The sun was rising for the third time since he had put to sea
when the fish started to
circle.
He could not see by the slant of the line that the fish was
circling. It was too early for
that. He just felt a faint slackening of the pressure of the
line and he commenced to pull
on it gently with his right hand. It tightened, as always,
but just when he reached
the
point where it would break, line began to come in. He slipped
his shoulders and head
from under the line and began to pull in
line steadily and gently. He used both of
his
hands in a swinging motion and tried to do the pulling as much
as he could with his body
and his legs. His old legs and shoulders pivoted with the
swinging of the pulling.
“It is a very big circle,” he said. “But he
is circling.” Then the line would not come
in
any more and he held it until he saw the drops jumping from it
in the sun. Then it
started
out and the old man knelt down and let it go grudgingly back
into the dark water.
“He is making the far part of his circle
now,” he said. I must hold all I can,
he
thought. The strain will [86] shorten his circle each time.
Perhaps in an hour I will
see
him. Now I must convince him and then I must
kill him.
But the fish kept on circli ng slowly and the old man was wet
with sweat and tired
deep into his bones two hours later. But the
circles were much shorter now and from
the
way the line slanted he could tell the fi sh had risen
steadily while he swam.
For an hour the old man had been seeing
black spots before his eyes and the
sweat
salted his eyes and salted the cut over his ey e and on his
forehead. He was not afraid of
the black spots. They were normal at the tens ion that he was
pullin g on the line. Twice,
though, he had felt faint and di zzy and that had worried him.
“I could not fail myself and die on a fish
like this,” he said. “Now that I have
him
coming so beautifully, God help me endure.
I’ll say a hundred Our Fathers and a
hundred
Hail Marys. But I cann ot say them now.
Consider them said, he thought. I’ll say them later. Just then
he felt a sudden
banging and jerking on the line he held with his two hands. It
was sharp and hard-feeling
and heavy.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 33 -
He is hitting the wire leader with his spear, he [87] thought.
That was bound to come.
He had to do that. It may make him jump though and I would
rather he stayed circling
now. The jumps were necessary for him to take air. But after
that each one can widen the
opening of the hook wound and he can throw the hook.
“Don’t jump, fish,” he said. “Don’t jump.”
The fish hit the wire several times more and
each time he shook his head the old
man gave up a little line.
I must hold his pain where it is, he
thought. Mine do es not matter. I can
control
mine. But his pain could drive him mad.
After a while the fish stoppe d beating at the wire and
started circling slowly again.
The old man was gaining line steadily now. But he felt faint
again. He lifted some sea
water with his left hand and put it on his head. Then he put
more on and rubbed the back
of his neck.
“I have no cramps,” he said. “He’ll be up soon and I can last.
You have to last. Don’t
even speak of it.”
He kneeled against the bow and, for a moment , slipped the
line over his back again.
I’ll rest now while he goes out on the
circle and then stand up and work on him when
he
comes in, he decided.
[88] It was a great temptation to rest in the bow and let the
fish make one circle by
himself without recovering any line. But when the strain show
ed the fish had turned to
come toward the boat, the old man rose to
his feet and started the pivoting and
the
weaving pulling that brought in all the line
he gained.
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. I
need that badly.
“I’ll rest on the next turn as he goes out,”
he said. “I feel much better. Then in two
or
three turns more I will have him.”
His straw hat was far on the back of his head and he sank down
into the bow with the
pull of the line as he felt the fish turn.
You work now, fish, he thought. I’ll take you at the turn.
The sea had risen considerably. But it was a fair-weather
breeze and he had to have it
to get home.
“I’ll just steer south and west,” he said. “A man is never
lost at sea and it is a long
island.”
It was on the third turn that he saw the fish first.
He saw him first as a dark shadow that took
so long [89] to pass under the boat
that
he could not believe its length.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 34 -
“No,” he said. “He can’t be that big.”
But he was that big and at the end of this circle he came
to the surface only
thirty
yards away and the man saw his tail out of
water. It was hi gher than a big scythe
blade
and a very pale lavender above the dark blue
water. It raked back and as the fish
swam
just below the surface the old man could see
his huge bulk and the purple stripes
that
banded him. His dorsal fin was down and his huge pectorals
were spread wide.
On this circle the old man co uld see the fish’s eye and the
two gray sucking fish that
swain around him. Sometimes they attached themselves to him.
So metimes they darted
off. Sometimes they would swim easily in his
shadow. They were each over three feet
long
and when they swam fast they lashed their whole bodies like
eels.
The old man was sweating now but from so mething else besides
the sun. On each
calm placid turn the fish made he was gain ing line and he was
su re that in two turns
more he would have a chance to get the harpoon in.
[90] But I must get him close, close, close, he thought. I
mustn’t try for the head. I
must get the heart.
“Be calm and strong, old man,” he said.
On the next circle the fish’s beck was out but he
was a little too far from the boat.
On
the next circle he was still too far away
but he was higher out of water and the old
man
was sure that by gaining some more line he could have him
alongside.
He had rigged his harpoon long before and its coil of light
rope was in a round basket
and the end was made fast to the bitt in the bow.
The fish was coming in on his circle now calm and beautiful
looking and only his
great tail moving. The old man pulled on him all that he co
uld to bring him closer. For
just a moment the fish turned a little on
his side. Then he straightened himself and
began
another circle.
“I moved him,” the old man said. “I moved
him then.”
He felt faint again now but he held on the great fish all the
strain that he could. I
moved him, he thought. Maybe this time I can
get him over. Pull, hands, he thought.
Hold up, legs. Last for me, head. Last for
me. You never went. This time I’ll pull him over.
[91] But when he put all of his effort on,
starting it well out before the fish came
alongside and pulling with all his strength, the fish pulled
pa rt way over and then righted
himself and swam away.
“Fish,” the old man said. “Fish, you are going
to have to die anyway. Do you have
to
kill me too?”
That way nothing is accomplished, he thought. His mouth was
too dry to speak but
he could not reach for the water now. I must
get him alongside this time, he thought.
I
am not good for many more turns. Yes you are,
he told himself. You’re good for ever.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 35 -
On the next turn, he nearly had him. But again the fish
righted himself and swam
slowly away.
You are killing me, fish, the old man though t. But you have a
ri ght to. Never have I
seen a greater, or more beautiful, or a calmer or more noble
th ing than you, brother.
Come on and kill me. I do not care who kills who.
Now you are getting confused in the head, he thought. You must
keep your head
clear. Keep your head clear and know how to su ffer like a
man. Or a fish, he thought.
“Clear up, head,” he said in a voice he
could hardly hear. “Clear up.”
[92] Twice more it was the same on the turns. I do not know,
the old man thought.
He had been on the point of feeling himself go each time. I do
not know. But I will try it
once more. He tried it once more and he felt himself going
when he turned the fish. The
fish righted himself and swam off again slowly
with the great tail weaving in the air.
I’ll
try it again, the old man promised, although his hands were
mushy now and he could
only see well in flashes. He tried it again and it was the
same. So he thought, and he felt
himself going before he started; I will try
it once again.
He took all his pain and what was left of his strength an d
his long gone pride and he
put it against the fish’s agony and the fish came over onto
his side and swam gently on his
side, his bill almost touching the planking of the skiff and
started to pass the boat,
long,
deep, wide, silver and barred with purple and interminable in
the water.
The old man dropped the line and put his foot on it and lift
ed the harpoon as high as
he could and drove it down with all his strength, and more
strength he had [93] just
summoned, into the fish’s side just behind the
great chest fin that rose high in the air
to
the altitude of the man’s chest. He felt the iron go in and
he leaned on it and drove
it
further and then pushed all his weight after it.
Then the fish came alive, with his death in him, and rose high
out of the water
showing all his great length and width and
all his power and his beauty. He seemed to
hang in the air above the old man in the skiff. Then he fell
into the water with a crash that
sent spray over the old man an d over all of the skiff.
The old man felt faint and sick and he coul d not see well.
But he cleared the harpoon
line and let it run slowly through his raw hands and, when he
could see, he saw the fish
was on his back with his silver belly up. The shaft of the
harpoon was projecting at
an
angle from the fish’s shoulder and the sea was discolouring
with the red of the blood
from
his heart. First it was dark as a shoal in the blue water that
was more than a mile
deep.
Then it spread like a cloud. The fish was silvery and still
and floated with the waves.
The old man looked carefully in the glimpse of vision that he
had. Then he took two
turns of the harpoon [94] line around the
bitt in the bow and hid his head on his hands.
“Keep my head dear,” he said against the wood of the bow.
“I am a tired old man.
But
I have killed this fish which is my brot her and now I must do
the slave work.”
Now I must prepare the nooses and the rope
to lash him alongside, he thought.
Even
if we were two and swamped her to load him
and bailed her out, this skiff would
never
The Old Man and the Sea
- 36 -
hold him. I must prepare everything, then bring him in and
lash him well and step the
mast and set sail for home.
He started to pull the fish in to have him alongside so that
he could pass a line
through his gills and out his mouth and make his head fast
alongside the bow. I want to
see him, he thought, and to touch and to feel him. He is my
fortune, he thought. But that
is not why I wish to feel him. I think I felt his heart, he
thought. When I pushed on
the
harpoon shaft the second time. Bring him in now and make him
fast and get the noose
around his tail and another around hi s middle to bind him to
the skiff.
“Get to work, old man,” he said. He took a very [95] small
drink of the water. “There
is very much slave work to be done now that the fight is
over.”
He looked up at the sky and then out to his fish. He looked
at the sun carefully. It
is
not much more than noon, he thought. And the trade wind is
rising . The lines all mean
nothing now. The boy and I will splice them when we are home.
“Come on, fish,” he said. But the fish did not come.
Instead he lay there wallowing now in the
seas and the old man pulled the
skiff upon
to him.
When he was even with him and had the fish’s head against th e
bow he could not
believe his size. But he untied the harpoon rope from the
bitt, passed it through the fish’s
gills and out his jaws, made a turn around
his sword then passed the rope through the
other gill, made another turn around the bill and knotted the
double rope and made it
fast to the bitt in the bow. He cut the rope th en and went
astern to noose the tail. The
fish
had turned silver from his original purple and silver, and the
stripes showed the same
pale violet colour as his tail. They were wider than a man’s
hand with his fingers spread
and the fish’s eye looked as detached as th e mirrors in a
periscop e or as a saint in a
procession.
[96] “It was the only way to kill him,” the old man said. He
was feeling better since
the water and he knew he would not go away
and his head was clear. He’s over
fifteen
hundred pounds the way he is, he thought. Maybe much more. If
he dresses out
two-thirds of that at thirty cents a pound?
“I need a pencil for that,” he said. “My he ad is not that
clear. But I think the great
DiMaggio would be proud of me today. I had no bone spurs. But
the hands and the back
hurt truly.” I wonder what a bone spur is, he thought. Maybe
we have them without
knowing of it.
He made the fish fast to bow and stern and to the middle
thwart. He was so big it
was like lashing a much bigger skiff alongside. He cut a piece
of line and tied the fish’s
lower jaw against his bill so his mouth would
not open and they would sail as cleanly
as
possible. Then he stepped the mast and, with
the stick that was his gaff and with
his
boom rigged, the patched sail drew, the boat be gan to move,
and half lying in the stern
he
sailed south-west.
He did not need a compass to tell him where southwest was. He
o nly needed the feel
The Old Man and the Sea
- 37 -
of the trade wind and the drawing of the sail . I better put a
small line [97] out with
a
spoon on it and try and get something to eat and drink for the
moisture. But he could not
find a spoon and his sardines were rotten. So he hooked a
patch of yellow Gulf weed with
the gaff as they passed and shook it so that the small shrimps
that were in it fell onto the
planking of the skiff. There were more than a dozen of them
and they jumped and kicked
like sand fleas. The old man pinched their
heads off with his thumb and forefinger
and
ate them chewing up the shells and the tails. They were very
tiny but he knew they were
nourishing and they tasted good.
The old man still had two drinks of water in
the bottle and he used half of one
after
he had eaten the shrimps. The skiff was sailing well
considering the handicaps and he
steered with the tiller under his arm. He could
see the fish and he had only to
look at his
hands and feel his back agains t the stern to know that this
had truly happened and
was
not a dream. At one time when he was feeling so badly toward
the end, he had thought
perhaps it was a dream. Then when he had seen the fish come
out of the water and hang
motionless in the sky before he fell, he was sure there was
some great strangeness and he
could not believe it.
[98] Then he could not see well, although
now he saw as well as ever. Now he
knew
there was the fish and his hands and back we re no dream. The
hands cure quickly, he
thought. I bled them clean and the salt water will heal them.
The dark water of the true
gulf is the greatest healer th at there is. All I must do is
keep the head clear. The
hands
have done their work and we sail well. With his mouth shut
and his tail straight up
and
down we sail like brothers. Then his head
started to become a little unclear and he
thought, is he bringing me in or am I bringi ng him in? If I
were to wing him behind there
would be no question. Nor if th e fish were in the
skiff, with all dignity gone, there
would
be no question either. But they were sailing
together lashed side by side and the old
man
thought, let him bring me in if it pleases
him. I am only be tter than him through
trickery
and he meant me no harm.
They sailed well and the old man soaked his hands in the salt
water and tried to keep
his head clear. There were hi gh cumulus clouds and enough
cirrus above them so that
the
old man knew the breeze would last all night. The old man
looked at the fish constantly
[99] to make sure it was true. It was an
hour before the first shark hit him.
The shark was not an accident. He had come up from deep down
in the water as the
dark cloud of blood had settled and dispersed
in the mile deep sea. He had come up
so
fast and absolutely without caution that he broke th e surface
of the blue water and was
in
the sun. Then he fell back into the sea and picked up the
scent and started swimming on
the course the skiff and the fish had taken.
Sometimes he lost the scent. But he would pick it up again, or
have just a trace of it,
and he swam fast and hard on the course. He was a very big
Make shark built to swim as
fast as the fastest fish in the sea and everything about him
was beautiful except his jaws.
His back was as blue as a sword fish’s and his belly was
silver and his hide was smooth
and handsome. He was built as a sword fish
except for his huge jaws which were
tight
shut now as he swam fast, just under the surface with his high
dorsal fin knifing through
the water without wavering. Inside the closed doub le lip of
his jaws all of his eight rows
of
teeth were slanted inwards. They were not
the ordinary pyramid-shaped teeth of
most
The Old Man and the Sea
- 38 -
sharks. They were shaped like a man’s [100]
fingers when they are crisped like
claws.
They were nearly as long as the fingers of the old ma n and
they had razor-sharp cutting
edges on both sides. This was a fish built to feed on all the
fi shes in the sea, that were so
fast and strong and well armed that they had
no other enemy. Now he speeded up as
he
smelled the fresher scent and his bl ue dorsal fin cut the
water.
When the old man saw him coming he knew that this was a shark
that had no fear at
all and would do exactly what he wished. He
prepared th e harpoon and made the rope
fast while he watched the shark come on. The ro pe was short
as it la cked what he had cut
away to lash the fish.
The old man’s head was clear and good now an d he was full of
resolution but he had
little hope. It was too good to last, he
thought. He took one look at the great fish as
he
watched the shark close in. It might as well have been a
dream, he thought. I cannot keep
him from hitting me but maybe I can get him. Dentuso, he
thought. Bad luck to your
mother.
The shark closed fast astern and when he hit the fish the old
man saw his mouth
open and his strange eyes and the clicking chop of the teeth
as he drove forward in the
meat just above the tail. The shark’s head [101] was out of
water and his back was coming
out and the old man could hear th e noise of skin and flesh
ripp ing on the big fish when he
rammed the harpoon down onto the shark’s he ad at a spot where
the line between his
eyes intersected with the line that ran straight back from his
nose. There were no such
lines. There was only the he avy sharp blue head and the big
eyes and the clicking,
thrusting all-swallowing jaws. But that was th e location of
the brain and the old man hit
it. He hit it with his blood mushed hands driving a good
harpoon with all his strength.
He
hit it without hope but with resolution and complete
malignancy.
The shark swung over and the old man saw his eye was not alive
and then he swung
over once again, wrapping himself in two loops of the rope.
The old man knew that he
was dead but the shark would no t accept it. Then, on his
back, with his tail lashing
and
his jaws clicking, the shark plowed over the water as a
speedboat does. The water was
white where his tail beat it and three-quarters of his body
was clea r above the water when
the rope came taut, shivered, and then snappe d. The shark lay
quietly for a little while on
the surface and the old man watched him.
Then he went down very slowly.
[102] “He took about forty pounds,” the old
man said aloud. He took my harpoon
too
and all the rope, he thought, and now my fish
bleeds again and there will be others.
He
did not like to look at the fish anymore since he had been
mutilated. When the fish
had
been hit it was as though he himself were
hit. But I killed the shark that hit my fish,
he
thought. And he was the bigg est dentuso that I have ever
seen. And God knows that
I
have seen big ones. It was too good to last,
he thought. I wish it had been a dream
now
and that I had never hooked the fish and was alone in bed on
the newspapers.
“But man is not made for defeat,” he said.
“A man can be destroyed but not
defeated.” I am sorry that I killed the fish though, he
thought. Now the bad time is
coming and I do not even have the harpoon. Th e dentuso is
cruel and able and strong and
intelligent. But I was more intelligent than he was. Perhaps
not, he thought. Perhaps I
was only better armed.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 39 -
“Don’t think, old man,” he said aloud. “Sail on this course
and take it when it comes.
But I must think, he thought. Because it is all I have left.
That and baseball. I wonder
how the great [103] DiMaggio would have liked the way I hit
him in the brain? It was no
great thing, he thought. Any man could do
it. But do you think my hands were as great
a
handicap as the bone spurs? I cannot know. I never had
anything wrong with my heel
except the time the sting ray stung it wh en I stepped on him
when swimming and
paralyzed the lower leg and made the unbearable pain.
“Think about something cheerful, old man ,” he said. “Every
minute now you are
closer to home. You sail lighter for the
loss of forty pounds.”
He knew quite well the pattern of what could happen when he
reached the inner part
of the current. But there was nothing to be
done now.
“Yes there is,” he said aloud. “I can lash my
knife to the butt of one of the
oars.”
So he did that with the tiller under his arm
and the sheet of the sail under his foot.
“Now,” he said. “I am still an old man. But
I am not unarmed.”
The breeze was fresh now and he sailed on well. He watched
only the forward part of
the fish and some of his hope returned.
It is silly not to hope, he thought. Beside s I believe [104]
it is a sin. Do not think
about sin, he thought. There are enough pr oblems now without
si n. Also I have no
understanding of it.
I have no understanding of it and I am not
sure that I believe in it. Perhaps it was
a
sin to kill the fish. I suppose it was even
though I did it to keep me alive and feed
many
people. But then everything is a sin. Do not
think about sin. It is much too late for
that
and there are people who are paid to do it. Let
them think about it. You were born to be
a
fisherman as the fish was born to be a fish . San Pedro was a
fisherman as was the father
of the great DiMaggio.
But he liked to think about all things that he was involved in
and since there was
nothing to read and he did not have a radio, he thought much
and he kept on thinking
about sin. You did not kill the fish only to keep alive and to
sell for food, he thought. You
killed him for pride and because you are a fi sherman. You
loved him when he was alive
and you loved him after. If you love him, it
is not a sin to kill him. Or is it more?
“You think too much, old man,” he said aloud.
But you enjoyed killing the dentuso, he thought. He lives on
the live fish as you do.
He is not a scavenger [105] nor just a moving appetite as some
sharks are. He is
beautiful
and noble and knows no fear of anything.
“I killed him in self-defense,” the old ma n said aloud. “And
I killed him well.”
Besides, he thought, everything kills everything else in some
way. Fishing kills me
exactly as it keeps me alive. The boy keeps
me alive, he thought. I must not
deceive
The Old Man and the Sea
- 40 -
myself too much.
He leaned over the side and pulled loose a
piece of the meat of the fish where
the
shark had cut him. He chewed it and noted its
quality and its good taste. It was firm
and
juicy, like meat, but it was not red. There wa s no
stringiness in it and he knew that
it
would bring the highest price In the market. But there was no
way to keep its scent out
of
the water and the old man knew that a very had time was
coming.
The breeze was steady. It had backed a little further into the
north-east and he knew
that meant that it would not fa ll off. The old man
looked ahead of him but he could see
no
sails nor could he see the hull nor the smoke of any ship.
There were only the flying
fish
that went up from his bow sailing away to ei ther side and the
yellow patches of Gulf
weed.
He could not even see a bird.
[106] He had sailed for two hours, resting in the stern and
sometimes chewing a bit
of the meat from the marlin, trying to rest and to be strong,
when he saw the first of the
two sharks. “Ay,” he said aloud. There is no translation for
this word and perhaps it is
just a noise such as a man might make, invo luntarily, feeling
the nail go through his
hands and into the wood.
“Galanos,” he said aloud. He had seen the
second fin now coming up behind
the first
and had identified them as shovel-nosed sharks by the brown,
triangular fin and the
sweeping movements of the tail . They had the scent and were
excited and in the
stupidity
of their great hunger they were losing and fi nding the scent
in their excitement. But they
were closing all the time.
The old man made the sheet fast and jammed the tiller. Then he
took up the oar with
the knife lashed to it. He lifted it as lightl y as he could
because his hands rebelled at the
pain. Then he opened and closed them on it lightly to loosen
them. He closed them firmly
so they would take the pain now and would
not flinch and watched the sharks come. He
could see their wide, flattened, shovel-point ed heads now and
their white tipped wide
pectoral fins. They were hateful sharks, [107] bad smelling,
scavengers as well as killers,
and when they were hungry they would bite at an oar or the
rudder of a boat. It was these
sharks that would cut the turtle s’ legs and flippers off when
the turtles were asleep on
the
surface, and they would hit a man in the
water, if they were hungry, even if the man
had
no smell of fish blood nor of fish slime on
him.
“Ay,” the old man said. “Galanos. Come on galanos.”
They came. But they did not come as the Mako had come. One
turned and went out
of sight under the skiff and the old man could feel the skiff
shake as he jerked and pulled
on the fish. The other watched the old man
with his slitted ye llow eyes and then came
in
fast with his half circle of jaws wide to hit the fish where
he had already been bitten. The
line showed clearly on the top of his brow n head and back
where the brain joined
the
spinal cord and the old man drove the knife on
the oar into the juncture, withdrew it,
and
drove it in again into the shark’s yellow cat-like eyes. The
shark let go of the fish and slid
down, swallowing what he had taken as he died.
The skiff was still shaking with the destruction the other
shark was doing to the fish
and the old man let [108] go the sheet so th at the skiff
would swing broadside and bring
The Old Man and the Sea
- 41 -
the shark out from under. When he saw the sh ark he leaned
over the side and punched at
him. He hit only meat and the hide was set hard and he barely
got the knife in. The blow
hurt not only his hands but his shoulder
too. But the shark came up fast with his head
out
and the old man hit him squarely in the center of his
flat-topped head as his nose came
out of water and lay against the fish. The
old man withdrew the blade and punched
the
shark exactly in the same spot again. He stil l hung to the
fish with his jaws hooked and
the old man stabbed him in his left eye. The
shark still hung there.
“No?” the old man said and he drove the
blade between th e vertebrae and the brain.
It was an easy shot now and he felt the
cartilage sever. Th e old man reversed the oar
and
put the blade between the shark’s jaws to open them. He
twisted the blade and as the
shark slid loose he said, “Go on, galano. Slide down a mile
deep. Go see your friend,
or
maybe it’s your mother.”
The old man wiped the blade of his knife an d laid down the
oar. Then he found the
sheet and the sail filled and he brought the skiff onto her
course.
[109] “They must have taken a quarter of him and of the best
meat,” he said aloud. “I
wish it were a dream and that I had never hooked him. I’m
sorry about it, fish. It
makes
everything wrong.” He stopped and he did not want to look at
the fish now. Drained of
blood and awash he looked the colour of the silver backing of
a minor and his stripes still
showed.
“I shouldn’t have gone out so far, fish,” he said. “Neither
for you nor for me. I’m
sorry, fish.”
Now, he said to himself. Look to the lashing on the knife and
see if it has been cut.
Then get your hand in order becaus e there still is more to
come.
“I wish I had a stone for the knife,” the
old man said after he had checked the
lashing
on the oar butt. “I should ha ve brought a stone.” You should
have brought many things,
he thought. But you did not bring them, old man. Now is no
time to think of what you do
not have. Think of what you can do with what there is.
“You give me much good coun sel,” he said aloud. “I’m tire d
of it.” He held the tiller
under his arm and soaked both his hands in the water as the
skiff drove forward. “God
knows how much that last one took,” he said.
[110] “But she’s much ligh ter now.” He did not want
to think of the mutilated
under-side of the fish. He knew that each of the jerking bumps
of the shark had been
meat torn away and that the fish now made a trail for all
sharks as wide as a highway
through the sea.
He was a fish to keep a man all winter, he
thought Don’t think of that. Just rest
and
try to get your hands in shape to defend what is left of him.
The blood smell from my
hands means nothing now with all that scent in the water.
Besides they do not bleed
much. There is nothing cut that means anything. The bleeding
may keep the left from
cramping.
What can I think of now? he thought. Nothing. I must think of
nothing and wait for
The Old Man and the Sea
- 42 -
the next ones. I wish it had really been a
dream, he thought. But who knows? It might
have turned out well.
The next shark that came was a single shovelnose. He came like
a pig to the trough if
a pig had a mouth so wi de that you could put your head in it.
The old man let him hit the
fish and then drove the knife on the oar don
into his brain. But the shark jerked
backwards as he rolled and the knife blade snapped.
The old man settled himself to steer. He did not even watch
the big shark sinking
slowly in the water, [111] sh owing first life-size, then
small, then tiny. That always
fascinated the old man. But he did not even
watch it now.
“I have the gaff now,” he sa id. “But it will do no good. I
have the two oars and the
tiller and the short club.”
Now they have beaten me, he thought. I am too old to club
sharks to death. But I will
try it as long as I have the oars and the
short club and the tiller.
He put his hands in the water again to soak them. It was
getting la te in the afternoon
and he saw nothing but the sea and the sky. There was more
wind in the sky than there
had been, and soon he hoped that he would see land.
“You’re tired, old man,” he sa id. “You’re tired inside.”
The sharks did not hit him agai n until just before sunset.
The old man saw the brown fins coming along the wide trail
the fish must make in
the water.
They were not even quartering on the scent.
They were he aded straight for the skiff
swimming side by side. He jammed the tiller, made the sheet
fast and reached under the
stem for the club. It was an oar handle [112 ] from a broken
oar sawed off to about two
and a half feet in length. He could only use it
effectively with one hand because of the grip
of the handle and he took good hold
of
it with his right hand, flexing his hand on
it, as he watche d the sharks come. They
were
both galanos.
I must let the first one get a good hold and
hit him on the point of the nose or
straight across the top of the head, he
thought.
The two sharks closed together and as he saw the one nearest
him open his jaws and
sink them into the silver side of the fish,
he raised the club high and brought it
down
heavy and slamming onto the top of the shark’s broad head. He
felt the rubbery solidity
as the club came down. But he felt the
rigidity of bone too and he struck the shark
once
more hard across the point of the nose as he slid down from
the fish.
The other shark had been in and out and now
came in again with his jaws wide. The
old man could see pieces of the meat of the fish spilling
white from the corner of his jaws
as he bumped the fish and closed his jaws. He swung at him and
hit only the head and the
shark looked at him and wrenched the meat loose. The [113] old
man swung the club
The Old Man and the Sea
- 43 -
down on him again as he slipped away to
swallow and hit only the heavy solid
rubberiness.
“Come on, galano,” the old man said. “Come in again.”
The shark came in a rush and the old man hit
him as he shut his jaws. He hit him
solidly and from as high up as he could raise
the club. This time he felt the bone at
the
base of the brain and he hit him again in
the same place while the shark tore the
meat
loose sluggishly and slid down from the fish.
The old man watched for him to come again but neither shark
showed. Then he saw
one on the surface swimming in circles. He did not se e the
fin of the other.
I could not expect to kill them, he thought. I could have in
my time. But I have hurt
them both badly and neither one can feel very good. If I could
have used a bat with two
hands I could have killed the first one
surely. Even now, he thought.
He did not want to look at the fish. He knew that half of him
had been destroyed.
The sun had gone down while he had been in the fight with the
sharks.
“It will be dark soon,” he s aid. “Then I should see [114] th
e glow of Havana.. If I am
too far to the eastward I will see the
lights of one of the new
beaches.”
I cannot be too far out now, he thought. I
hope no one has been too worried. There
is
only the boy to worry, of co urse. But I am sure he would
have confidence. Many of
the
older fishermen will worry. Many others too, he thought. I
live in a good town.
He could not talk to the fish anymore because the fish had
been ruined too badly.
Then something came into his head.
“Half fish,” he said. “Fish that you were. I
am sorry that I went too far
out. I ruined
us both. But we have killed many sharks, you and I, and ruined
many others. How many
did you ever kill, old fish? You do not have
that spear on your head for nothing.”
He liked to think of the fish and what he
could do to a shark if he were
swimming
free. I should have chopped the bill off to fi ght them with,
he thought. But there was no
hatchet and then there was no knife.
But if I had, and could have lashed it to an
oar butt, what a we apon. Then we might
have fought them together. What will you do
now if they come in the night? What can
you
do?
“Fight them,” he said. “I’ll fight them until I die.”
[115] But in the dark now an d no glow showing and no lights
and only the wind and
the steady pull of the sail he felt that
perhaps he was alre ady dead. He put his two
hands
together and felt the palms. They were not
dead and he could bring the pain of life by
simply opening and closing them. He leaned his back against
the stern and knew he was
not dead. His shoulders told him.
I have all those prayers I prom ised if I caught the fish, he
thought. But I am too
tired
The Old Man and the Sea
- 44 -
to say them now. I better get the sa ck and put it over my
shoulders.
He lay in the stern and steered and watched for the glow to
come in the sky. I have
half of him, he thought. Maybe I’ll have the luck to bring the
forward half in. I should
have some luck. No, he said. You violated
your luck when you went too far outside.
“Don’t be silly,” he said aloud. “And keep
awake and st eer. You may have much luck
yet.”
“I’d like to buy some if there’s any place they sell it,” he
said.
What could I buy it with? he asked himself. Could I buy it
with a lost harpoon and a
broken knife and two bad hands?
“You might,” he said. “You tried to buy it
with [116] eighty-fou r days at sea.
They
nearly sold it to you too.”
I must not think nonsense, he thought. Luck
is a thing that comes in many forms
and
who can recognize her? I would take some thou gh in any form
and pay what they asked. I
wish I could see the glow from the lights, he
thought. I wish too many things. But that
is
the thing I wish for now. He tried to settle more comfortably
to steer and from his pain he
knew he was not dead.
He saw the reflected glare of the lights of the city at what
must have been around ten
o’clock at night. They were only perceptible at first as the
light is in the sky before the
moon rises. Then they were steady to see across the ocea n
which was rough now with the
increasing breeze. He steered inside of the gl ow and he
thought that now, soon, he must
hit the edge of the stream.
Now it is over, he thought. They will probably hit me again.
But what can a man do
against them in the dark without a weapon?
He was stiff and sore now and his wounds and all of the
strained parts of his body
hurt with the cold of the night. I hope I do
not have to fight again, he thought. I hope
so
much I do not have to fight again.
[117] But by midnight he foug ht and this time he knew the
fight was useless. They
came in a pack and he could only see the lines in the water
that their fins made and their
phosphorescence as they threw themselves on
the fish. He clubbed at heads and
heard
the jaws chop and the shaking of the skif f as they took hold
below. He clubbed
desperately at what he could only feel and hear and he felt
something seize the club and it
was gone.
He jerked the tiller free from the rudder and beat and chopped
with it, holding it in
both hands and driving it down again and again. But they were
up to the bow now and
driving in one after the other and together, tearing off the
pieces of meat that showed
glowing below the sea as they turned to come once more.
One came, finally, against the head itself and he knew that it
was over. He swung the
tiller across the shark’s head wh ere the jaws were caught in
the heaviness of the
fish’s
head which would not tear. He swung it once
and twice and again. He heard the
tiller
The Old Man and the Sea
- 45 -
break and he lunged at the shark with the splintered butt. He
felt it go in and knowing it
was sharp he drove it in agai n. The shark let go and rolled
away. That was the [118] last
shark of the pack that came. There was nothing more for them
to eat.
The old man could hardly breathe now and he felt a strange
taste in his mouth. It
was coppery and sweet and he was afraid of
it for a moment. But th ere was not much
of
it.
He spat into the ocean and said, “Eat that, ga lanos. And make
a dream you’ve killed
a man.”
He knew he was beaten now finally and without remedy and he
went back to the
stern and found the jagged end of the tiller would fit in the
slot of the rudder well
enough
for him to steer. He settled the sack around
his shoulders and put th e skiff on her
course.
He sailed lightly now and he had no thoughts nor any feelings
of any kind. He was past
everything now and he sailed the skiff to make
his home port as well and as
intelligently
as he could. In the night sharks hit the carcass as someone
might pick up crumbs from
the table. The old man paid no attention to them an d did not
pay any attention to
anything except steering. He only noticed
how lightly and bow well the skiff sailed
now
there was no great we ight beside her.
[119] She’s good, he thought. She is sound
and not harmed in any way except for
the
tiller. That is easily replaced . He could feel he was inside
the current now and he
could
see the lights of the beach colonies along th e shore. He knew
where he was now and it
was nothing to get home.
The wind is our friend, anyway, he thou ght. Then he added,
sometimes. And the
great sea with our friends and our enemies. And bed, he
thought. Bed is my friend. Just
bed, he thought. Bed will be a great thing. It is easy when
you are beaten, he thought.
I
never knew how easy it was. An d what beat you, he thought.
“Nothing,” he said aloud. “I went out too far.”
When he sailed into the little harbour the lights of the
Terrace we re out and he knew
everyone was in bed. The breeze had risen stea dily and was
blowing strongly now. It was
quiet in the harbour though and he sailed up onto the little
patch of shingle below the
rocks. There was no one to help him so he pulled the boat up
as far as he could. Then
he
stepped out and made her fast to a rock.
[120] He unstepped the mast and furled the
sail and tied it. Then he shouldered
the
mast and started to climb. It was then he knew the depth of
his tiredness. He stopped for
a moment and looked back and saw in the reflection from the
street light the great tail of
the fish standing up well behind the skiff’s stern. He saw the
white naked line of his
backbone and the dark mass of the head with the projecting
bill and all the nakedness
between.
He started to climb again and at the top he fell and lay for
some time with the mast
across his shoulder. He tried to get up. But it was too
difficult and he sat there with
the
mast on his shoulder and looked at the road. A cat passed on
the far side going about its
business and the old man watched it. Then he just watched the
road.
The Old Man and the Sea
- 46 -
Finally he put the mast down and stood up. He picked the mast
up and put it on his
shoulder and started up the road. He had to
sit down five times before he reached
his
shack.
Inside the shack he leaned the mast against the wall. In
the dark he found a water
bottle and took a drink. Then he lay down on
the bed. He pulled the blanket [121] over
his
shoulders and then over his back and legs and
he slept face down on the newspapers
with
his arms out straight and the palms of his hands up.
He was asleep when the boy looked in the door in the morning.
It was blowing so
hard that the drifting-boats would not be go ing out and the
boy had slept late and then
come to the old man’s shack as he had come
each morning. The boy saw that the old man
was breathing and then he saw the old man’s
hands and he started to cry. He went
out
very quietly to go to bring some coffee and
all the way down the road he was crying.
Many fishermen were around the skiff looking at what was
lashed beside it and one
was in the water, his trousers rolled up, meas uring the
skeleton with a length of line.
The boy did not go down. He had been there before an d one of
the fishermen was
looking after the skiff for him. “How is he?”
one of the fishermen shouted. “Sleeping,”
the
boy called. He did not care that they saw him crying. “Let
no one disturb him.” “He
was
eighteen feet from nose to tail,” the
fisherman who was measuring him called.
[122] “I believe it,” the boy said.
He went into the Terrace and asked for a can of
coffee.
“Hot and with plenty of milk and sugar in
it.”
“Anything more?”
“No. Afterwards I will see what he can eat.”
“What a fish it was,” the proprietor said.
“There has never been such a fish.
Those
were two fine fish you took yesterday too.” “Damn my fish,”
the boy said and he started to
cry again.
“Do you want a drink of any kind?” the proprietor asked.
“No,” the boy said. “Tell them not to bother Santiago. I’ll be
back.”
“Tell him how sorry I am.”
“Thanks,” the boy said.
The boy carried the hot can of coffee up to
the old man’s shack and sat by him
until
he woke. Once it looked as though he were
waking. But he had gone back into heavy
sleep
and the boy had gone across the road to bo rrow some wood to
heat the coffee.
Finally the old man woke.
[123] “Don’t sit up,” the boy said. “Drink this.”
The Old Man and the Sea
- 47 -
He poured some of the coffee in a glass.
The old man took it and drank it.
“They beat me, Manolin,” he sa id. “They truly beat me.”
“He didn’t beat you. Not the fish.”
“No. Truly. It was afterwards.”
“Pedrico is looking after the skiff and th e gear. What do you
want done with the
head?”
“Let Pedrico chop it up to use in fish traps.”
“And the spear?”
“You keep it if you want it.”
“I want it,” the boy said. “Now we must make
our plans about the other things.”
“Did they search for me?”
“Of course. With coast guard and with
planes.”
“The ocean is very big and a skiff is sma ll and hard to see,”
the old man said. He
noticed how pleasant it was to have someone to talk to instead
of speaking only to
himself and to the sea. “I mi ssed you,” he said. “What did
you catch?” “One the first
day.
One the second and two the third.”
[124] “Very good.”
“Now we fish together again.”
“No. I am not lucky. I am not lucky
anymore.”
“The hell with luck,” the boy said. “I’ll
bring the luck with me.”
“What will your family say?”
“I do not care. I caught two yesterday. But
we will fish together now for I still
have
much to learn.”
“We must get a good killing lance and alwa ys have it on
board. You can make the
blade from a spring leaf from an old Ford.
We can grind it in Guanabacoa. It should be
sharp and not tempered so it will break. My knife broke.”
“I’ll get another knife and have the spring ground.”
How many days of heavy brisa have we?”
“Maybe three. Maybe more.”
“I will have everything in order,” the boy said. “You get your
hands well old man.”
The Old Man and the Sea
- 48 -
“I know how to care for them. In the night I
spat something strange and felt
something in my chest was broken.” “Get that well too,” the
boy said. “Lie down, old man,
and I will bring you your clean shirt. And
something to eat.”
[125] “Bring any of the papers of the time that I was gone,”
the old man said.
“You must get well fast for there is much that I can learn and
you can teach me
everything.
How much did you suffer?” “Plenty,” the old man said.
“I’ll bring the food and the papers,” the b oy said. “Rest
well, ol d man. I will bring
stuff from the drugstore for your hands.”
“Don’t forget to tell Pedrico the head is his.”
“No. I will remember.”
As the boy went out the door and down the
worn coral rock road he was crying again.
That afternoon there was a party of tourists at the Terrace
and looking down in the
water among the empty beer cans and dead barracudas a woman
saw a great long white
spine with a huge tail at the end that
lifted and swung with the tide while the east
wind
blew a heavy steady sea outside the entrance to the harbour.
“What’s that?” she asked a waiter and pointe d to the long
backbone of the great fish
that was now just garbage waitin g to go out with the tide.
“Tiburon,” the waiter said. “Shark.” He was
meaning to explain what had happened.
“I didn’t know sharks had such ha ndsome, beautifully formed
tails.”
“I didn’t either,” her male companion said.
Up the road, in his shack, the old man was sleeping again. He
was still sleeping on
his face and the boy was sitting by him watc hing him. The old
man was dreaming about
the lions.
THE END.
The Old Man and the Sea
49
Ernest Hemingway, Writer
• Born: 21 July 1899
• Birthplace: Oak Park, Illinois
• Died: 2 July 1961 (suicide)
• Best Known As: Famously manly author of
For Whom the Bell
Tolls
Hemingway is one of the 20th century's most famous American
writers. His
books include The Sun Also Rises (1926),
A Farewell to Arms (1929), and
For
Whom the Bell Tolls (1940). Hemingway's plainspoken no-frills
writing style
became so famous that it was (and is)
frequent ly parodied. His dashing
machismo was almost as famous as his writing:
he lived in Paris, Cuba and
Key
West, fancied bullfighting and big game hunting, and served as
a war
correspondent in WWII and the Spanish Civil War. He sealed his
own notoriety
when he killed himself with a shotgun in
1961.
Hemingway was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in
1954...
Hemingway is sometimes called by hi s familiar nickname
"Papa"... His
birthdate is sometimes listed in error as 1898. According to a
1954 article in the
New York Times, "In most reference books and in his own
conversation he is
one year older because he gave 1898 as his birth date when he
tried to enlist [in
the army] early in 1917, and stuck to that date ever since"...
Hemingway's father
also committed suicide, shooting hims elf with a Civil War
pistol in 1928.
Works
Novels/Novellas
• (1925) The Torrents of Spring
• (1926) The Sun Also Rises
• (1929) A Farewell to Arms
• (1937) To Have and Have Not
• (1940) For Whom the Bell Tolls
• (1950) Across the River and Into the
Trees
• (1952) The Old Man and the Sea
• (1962) Adventures of a Young Man
The Old Man and the Sea
50
• (1970) Islands in the Stream
• (1986) The Garden of Eden
Nonfiction
• (1932) Death in the Afternoon
• (1935) Green Hills of Africa
• (1960) The Dangerous Summer
• (1964) A Moveable Feast
• (2003) Ernest Hemingway Selected Letters
1917-1961
• (2005) Under Kilimanjaro
Short story collections
• (1923) Three Stories and Ten Poems
• (1925) In Our Time
• (1927) Men Without Women
• (1932) The Snows of Kilimanjaro
• (1933) Winner Take Nothing
• (1938) The Fifth Column and the First
Forty-Nine Stories
• (1947) The Essential Hemingway
• (1953) The Hemingway Reader
• (1972) The Nick Adams Stories
• (1976) The Complete Short Stories of
Ernest Hemingway
• (1995) Collected Stories
The Old Man and the Sea
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