The Struggles of life

Since the beginning of time, humans have struggled. We struggle day to day to make the right decisions or to face a relentless obstacle in the way. We struggle to persevere through bodily unwillingness or to physically defend ourselves against adversary forces. We are constantly in a battle with ourselves to strive for companionship so we are not lonely. These are some of the types of struggles Santiago is forced to combat with in the Old man in the Sea novella.

In this novella, Santiago endures the affects of fishing on his own body. Ernest Hemingway portrays Santiago as an old, beaten-down man. He is in a constant fight with his body to not give up. He knows that his body can only take so much and that’s why he has some techniques to help him. “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.” (58). Santiago soothes his cramped hand by eating the tuna. Santiago knows he can not move on and expect to catch a fish without taking care of his body first. His predicament makes him stronger. His encouraging thoughts keep him optimistic and help him endure the pain. Even though a cramped hand will create a problem for him, he still keeps a clear head and doesn’t let the pestering problem keep him down. His will keeps him going to catch the fish.

Santiago is unwillingly faced with strong adversaries that interrupt his fishing. Just when Santiago was about to catch the Marlin, he encountered a pod of sharks. The sharks started to attack the godly marlin that Santiago had spent days to catch. He is then left with the last resort which is to fight. “The shark came to 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.” (114). Santiago uses any type of weapon to fend off the sharks. His brave personality and strength allow Santiago to take the shark. Also Santiago’s common sense, to beat the shark in the brain and stop him in his tracks, proves how fishing oriented Santiago is. He knows how to handle himself in tough situations and knows how to face them with courage.

One heart-wrenching struggle that Santiago tries to overcome is a companion. He wants someone to be there with him to accompany him on his fishing trips. He wants someone there to help him catch fish as another set of hands to take some of the strain off from him. He wants someone to be there for him to mend his cramped hand. He wants someone there to just share his life with and to talk to. “Then he said aloud, ‘I wish I had the boy. To help me and to see this.’”(48). Santiago still yearns for a friend, like the boy. The compassion for the boy to be there for him never goes away and we only see this weakness in him every so often. The dismal mood that surrounds him never seems to fade. Santiago only wishes for the boy to fill the void in his heart to lighten up his life.

Since the time Ernest Hemingway wrote the novella, one can peek at Santiago’s life and get a glimpse of his struggles. However, his will to do better and courageous actions lead readers to believe that his optimistic attitude will never get him down. There is always another day to come. Santiago’s life exemplifies of just how humans might struggle through life and that leaves one to believe that struggles do not destroy humans, but make them stronger.

3rd Quarter Outside Reading Book

Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier, HarperCollins Books, 1997 Genre: Fiction



Rebecca is about the narrator who is a young twenty-one year old woman who falls in love with and older man. The olderman is Mr. de Winter, Maxim, who is the master of Manderly. Manderly is this extrodinary mansion in England. Everyone has heard of Manderly and it had a reputation to be where the rich and elegant people have dinner parties and celebrate their glorious lives. It is also Mr. de Winter's house that he grew up in. When the narrator moves in to Manderly she is not welcomed with open arms from the cleaning staff, especially one person in particluar, Mrs. Danvers. Mrs. Danvers is the head of staff of maids and every other worker at Manderly. As the narrator discovers more and more about Manderly she finds out about Rebecca. Rebecca was the former Mrs. de Winters but mysteriously died about a year ago. She is constantly comparing herself to Rebecca because she is constantly told how wonderful she was by Mrs. Danvers and evryone else.The narrator believes that she could never live up to Rebecca's legacy because she was the one who planned every dinner party and every ocassion. She thought that she was perfect. But through the book she unfolds the truth about Rebecca and how she really died. The narrator discovers the real evil, conceited Rebecca that no one knew about and becomes more secure about her new role as a wife. As everything is supposedly wrapped up, Dapne Du Maurier ends the book abruptly with a surprised twist, Maderly burns down.


"Du Maurier is in a class by herself."-New York Times
"Excellent...perfect...mastery from surprise to surprise."-Christian Science Monitor


In Rebecca we see the life of a young woman who is telling the story of her experiences at Manderly. Daphne Du Maurier writes in very descrptive means, describing every little detail in a specific manner. She uses a lot of figurative writing to let the author imagine how something is done or looks like or feels like.

I haven't previously read anything by Du Maurier because I have never heard of her before. Now she is deceased but her books are amazing. If I had to compare one thing about her book to another I would say that she uses a lot of detail like in Twilight. She sometimes gives too much detail and uses too many extravegant words that then the words loose their meaning and then it is dragged on a little. But overall I thought it was an interesting book. I liked how she wrote a mystery novel and I liked how she developed her characters. An example would be Mrs. Danvers. At first I thought she would've been a nice old maid and that she only acted weird around the narrator because she was slowly adapting to the new wife. But in the middle of the book we find out that Mrs. Danvers hates the narrator so much that she tried to talk her into killing herself which was really shocking. I also thought the plot was intriging. It was a shocker that Rebecaa turned out to have an ugly personality and bad intentions. I liked how the author created it all.



"This drive twisted and turned like a serpent, scarce wider in places than a path, and above our heads was a great colonade of trees, whose branches nodded and intermingled with one another, making an archway for us, like the roof of a church." PG 65



I actually got this book because someone reccommended it to me. They said that they really enjoyed it so I decided to read it. It turns out it wasn't a bad book, I liked it a lot. Some places though were really hard to keep going because it dragged alittle in the begining. Though once I got into the mystery of Rebecca and start uncovering the secret, it became impossible to put down. It was very suspenseful in the middle and at the end because I didn't know what was going to happen next. After the author twisted the plot, it made me on the edge of my seat. I was really surprised how the book ended. I wished though we knew more about who burned Manderly and why, but I guess the author wanted to leave us still guessing about it all. Overall I give it two thumbs up.