A Day’s Wait

It’s known to us that Hemingway’s works are famous for the stereotypical “hard men” image, and naturally, in this essay, it’s Schatz who represents the “hard man”.

Because Schatz, the young boy, was wet behind the ears, he failed to distinguish Celsius from Fahrenheit, believing that he would die of the fever. He’d been so naïve to give the death sentence on his own, but he’d been so mature and strong-willing that he refused to be commiserated by others, even his blood father. According to the passage, this adorable boy used to be so maudlin that he’d even cry for little things that were of no importance. But when it comes to death, he chose to refrain and peacefully greeted it as an old friend, hoping to depart this life as equals. Compare to what he did in the past, his behavior was so impressive and I suppose even an adult is unable to reach that far.

The essay also described the father’s hunting experience that day after he left home, and here comes the second comparison. This part of the story is pretty relaxing and unrestrained, whereas the atmosphere in boy’s home was so depressed and repressive. Evidently, the former one brings out as well as highlighting the latter, and, for the second time, the “hard man” inside Schatz is transported to readers, which is exactly what the author wants to see and express, I must say.

Hemingway once served as a trunk driver in military during the World War I and was badly injured for several times. Due to his bravery, he was rewarded with Silver Medal. After that, he became a journalist, determining to uncover the truth in the war. However, the humdrum life took the pride, the dignity and the hope from him, which does get one’s morale down. Driven mad with hopeless longing, he turned to pens and ink, being addicted to the sea of literature and honored a noted representative of “the lost generation” by his followers. He made his leading characters stronger and sharper, inspired them to rise to the level as he wanted, forged the men of his dreams. And conversely, these men, who symbolize the trapped beast in his deep heart, lulled him into a sense of security, being the person as proud as there’s been. “A man is not made for defeat. A man can be destroyed but not defeated “, as he wrote in The Old Man and the Sea, after the long period of loss, he’s similarly encouraging people to be firm and inflexible through his works. He is not telling people it’s going to be easy, instead, he is telling people it’s going to be worth it. So just go for it, make that difference, and no mistake.

Besides, Hemingway is also world-noted due to his “iceberg principle”, which means use less words to express more deep implications, more varieties of implied meanings and more symbol colors. There are no worthless sentences in this short essay and the hunting part is fully of grammar mistakes at the first glance, we don’t even know what’s the subject is. But I can tell that’s exactly the way how “iceberg principle” works. From my perspective, Hemingway did it extremely so as to emphasize the main idea—to be unbeatable.