-Setting: Late 1940s in the coastline of Gulf Stream

-Point of view: the story is told in the third-person narrative but usage of monologue of Santiago helps readers have a better understanding about this old but strong fisherman

-Theme: The great determination, honor in fight and overcome the old age to struggle with nature forces.

-Protagonist: The old fisherman Santiago, who live his life with great ambition and tries his best to prove that he is able to fight “the greatest battle” in his life

-Verisimilitude: is when Santiago performs the act of holding the line over his back. It hurts him a lot. With the hot sun, and the tension that cut his flesh. This actually can make reader easily imagine the real thing happening before their eyes.

-Conflict: the old man has to struggle a lot in the fight with the strongest fish ever in his life

-Climax: is when the marlin circles around the skiff. The old man actually has run out of his all energy but still be able to grab the harpoon to stab it on the marlin

-Symbolism: The marlin and the shark, and the sea. I think they symbolize the hardness of the old age that Hemingway (represented by the old man) has to overcome during his last couple years. The lions in the dream of Santiago represents his strength when he was young and he recalls it as it is always around him, with him to fight with the big fish.

-Personification: the sea is compared to a woman by Santiago

-Tone: Hemingway describes the struggle of the old man with somewhat reverence, for his great determination and attitude of never give up

-Allusion: Mike Gonzalez, Joe DiMaggio, and the Yankees as Santiago and the boy discuss about baseball

-Motivation: for Santiago to go fishing: to prove that he is still a strong man despite his old age, wants to have a great achievement again

The story is about an old man named Santiago went fishing for 40 days already but was so unlucky that he caught no fish. The boy, Manolin, who went with him was forced to go with other fishing ships by his parents since they said that Santiago got bad luck. But the boy still came to help Santiago to push his skiff out to the sea everyday and helped him to find sardines. They became close friends that they talked about different things, especially baseball, and had lunch and dinner together. Then one day the old man decided to go on a long trip since he got a good feeling. He went off the shore so far and he saw a man-of-war bird, which was a sign for fish.

….

Then he saw something really big under the water, a big fish. He prayed for it to eat the tuna and be caught on the hook, which it finally did. Then Santiago had a long journey with the fish when it swam so far that Santiago no longer saw the landmark. After for so long time, almost a day, the marlin finally was killed by Santiago. Lucky for him the marlin hadn’t swum deep into the sea. If that had happened, only God knew what came to the old man.

But then Santiago had a hard time fighting with different kind of sharks since they all came for the blood from the marlin. But the old man finally killed and stopped them from biting the marlin and he got into the shore healthy. It was a really big marlin that everyone on land knew about it and even tourists were surprised. The old man finally got his greatest battle succeeded.

With an easy writing style, usage of so effective descriptive words, the smooth flow of event, Hemingway really created a great novel about a normal topic: fishing. On the top of this all is the idea of old man fighting against his old age, just like the image of his own Hemingway against his weakness when he grew old. The old man finally succeeded after a long trip and so did Hemingway on his greatest novel The Old Man and the Sea

-Protagonist: the main characters in the watcher are Chris Powell the lifeguard, Evan the girl,  and Margaret the watching girl.

-Antagonist: Father of Margaret turns out to be the real antagonist at the nearly end of the story

-Round character: Evan, Chris and Margaret are depicted the most

-Point of view: The story is told in Third person, combines with lots of dialogues

-Flashback: the time when Chris remembers about the death of his brother when Chris wasn’t even born. His brother died of drowning and his father couldn’t save him on time.

-Dramatic Irony: When Evan and his family come back after playing at the beach, they discover that someone intruded in their house and took some stuffs out. We, readers, all know that it was Margaret but Evan in the story didn’t know and he thinks that Shane is the one to blame.

-Flat character: Jenny, friend Chris, and Shane, friend of Evan, are the two flat character in which they are not depicted thoroughly and just have some simple personality traits.

-Allegory: the fairly tale which happens at the same time with story of Margaret, Chris, and Evan stands for the real things that happened and has been happening to them. As we follow carefully we readers can soon figure out that they are one version but written in different forms

-Climax: Is when Margaret faces Evan and Chris, those who are protecting her on one side and his evil father on one side. She has to decide either to tell the truth to Chris and escape or to tell them that her father is teaching her how to swim and continue a miserable life with him.

-Conflict: Between Chris and himself, Chris and his family, Margaret and herself, Margaret and her father.

-Verisimilitude: is what happens to Chris when he comes home after the party and has a terrible headache. This resembles the real thing happen to us after we drink a lot of alcohol and don’t take any nap.

]]> http://blog.ssis.edu.vn/stevenguyen26/blog/2010/02/04/the-watcher-cont/feed/ 0 http://blog.ssis.edu.vn/stevenguyen26/blog/2010/01/26/keeping-in-the-dark-those-feelings/ http://blog.ssis.edu.vn/stevenguyen26/blog/2010/01/26/keeping-in-the-dark-those-feelings/#comments Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:02:46 +0000 ngnguyen10 http://blog.ssis.edu.vn/stevenguyen26/?p=4 The Watcher, by James Howe

This is one of the most suitable books for teenagers.  The seaside resort is the setting of the story. A boy named Evan presents to people that his family is the most happiest family at the beach. He doesn’t really mind playing with other friends, but rather staying close to play with his little sister Callie. He even spends hours to build up sand castle and the cover that makes Callie looks like a real beautiful mermaid. Far away, sitting alone, is the watcher. A skinny girl with long hair always covers her face, dropping on a little notebook that makes her like who Callie has called Harriet the spy.

Guarding for the beach is a handsome guy named Chris, an idol of Evan. Evan always admired Chris and just wants to look cool like him.  Everybody, except for the girl-the watcher, seems to have a happy life. But Evan has his own question about the real happiness of his family. He thinks his parents are going to divorce, which every night his little sister always dreams of. Being separated from each other. But his mother says no, telling him that she would accept the imperfection of the family, just like the broken shell on the sand.

Chris has his own sadness. He always keeps a letter with him. One day it is discovered and read by his friends. It was a sad story about his departed brother since he hadn’t be born yet. His brother died of drowning, which obsessed and made his father trained Chris a professional swimmer.  Soon his job bores him. The party every night. Animal behaviors. All of those make him sick so that he wants to go home. Home.  As soon as he just calls his mother announcing he would be back, he doesn’t care at all. Doesn’t want to go back to that place anymore, with his uncared father.

Margaret. That is the name of the watcher. She lives in with a cruel father and an indifferent mother. Everyday, she’s been punished by her “father” for being bad to him. The sad sound of music echoes everyday covering all the hurt she’s been enduring.

Finally, Chris and Even get into rescue Margaret and she finally speaks out the truth to the police: “my father hurts me”.

The most interesting thing in this book is that parallel with the personal story told by Margaret, there is an allusion to a fairy tale. It’s about a princess, who was separated from her father in a ship wreck and later drifted into an island. At there, she was raised by a beast, and an enchanted doll, who always keeps the key of door to get out. Once the princess sneaks out and meets the prince Evario but at first doesn’t know that he is her lost brother until her piece of necklace found to fit with that of the queen.  But she can’t come back to her true family because the beast will kill them all. She doesn’t want that to happen. So she plans to give the beast the crown in exchange to her freedom. But the beast finally kill her family after taking the crown. …. The story goes on as the same time with the real one told by Margaret.

As it comes to the end, the enchanted doll is actually her mother, free from enchanting and begs for her forgiveness. The angel saves her finally, the angel-symbol of Chris and prince Evario-Evan.

Themes of the book are about the dark side, the trouble of teenagers. As Margaret is the center, she doesn’t dare to speak up about the abuse from her father and the impotence of her mother. Three teenagers all try to work along the way to firgure out how to solve their problems and the shortcoming of their parents. I just love this topic so much. Parents should pay more attention to their own kids’ feelings rather than ignoring their questions and cares. Fortunately, Evan’s family at last reunites and learns to live with imperfection and I think this is a meaningful ending

2 stories going on at the same time. The twist of a fairy tale and a true life story is what I found out that makes the book really engaging to the readers. It’s too long for me to tell all the details but as anyone who reads it will be “enchanted” to the way James Howe writes. The fairy tale is actually a foreshadowing for the real story, really makes you want to discover what will happen next.

SC

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