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Originally Posted by Bookpossum
I found this book very powerful, but almost unbearable to read. While I had sympathy for Santiago's situation, I disliked the whole premise of the heroic man battling and trying to overcome nature.
The real problem for me is that I just don't buy into the whole idea of its being noble to go into the wild to kill animals, especially for sport. Yes, I know that for Santiago this was his livelihood rather than a "sport", but for Hemingway, it was something he chose to do, and so something which he upholds as a virtue. So even though Santiago knew the fish was far too big for him to be able to bring it into the boat, he persisted in continuing the battle.
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Yes, Hemingway was a sport fisherman, though I think that's not quite completely fair to him in this case. He's not writing about his experience fishing, he's writing about a subsistence fisherman who fishes to survive. And while I will not read about Hemingway killing animals in Africa, I have to cut him some slack here. This is a fish, not a lion or an elephant, and it's for food, not for sport. Unless we are all going to become vegans, we will always have to kill to eat.
I actually think Santiago's directly killing the fish he will eat (or sell to buy his food) is far better than people who go into a local discount grocery and buy battery chickens that have been raised in inhumane conditions (I can post myriad links if you want) in order to meet the demand for cheap food. They aren't taking responsibility for their killing, or the conditions required to produce it at that price. (But let's NOT turn this into a P&R discussion, please!)
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So for me the story is compelling, but I am not tempted to read anything more by Hemingway because of those underlying themes.
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There are a couple of other Hemingway books I might be willing to read, but I admit that there are definitely others I am not willing to read, and for those very reasons.
Thank you for taking on the challenge of reading this and contributing. I think any really powerful book will be difficult for some to read, and good selections for this club will often push some of us out of our comfort zone. That's both the good and the hard about a good book club.