Author's Note: In these upcoming paragraphs you will read a couple signs of symbolism from the short story, "A Clean, Well-lighted Place" by Ernst Hemingway.
In every story,
there is symbolism, even if you don't see it. There may not be a lot, but there
is some! In the piece, "A Clean, Well-lighted Place" by Ernest
Hemingway, there are many signs of symbolism. Ernest Hemingway has written a
lot of symbolism into his pieces, and in this piece, the characters are a great
sign. The three main characters can all be explained differently from their own
actions. The symbolism in the story helps the reader understand the purpose of
the story and the characters in several ways.
There are times in
life where you change, not only once, but many times. A young, middle aged, and
old man can be completely different. There is plenty symbolism in the story,
"A Clean, Well-lighted Place". Three men, the young, middle aged, and
the old are all in a café around 3 am. The old man had been drinking by himself
as the two young and middle aged waiters wait for him to finish.
The younger man
didn’t understand why he was at a café and not a bar. As the young man wanted
to go home and to bed, he was getting crabby and rude with the old man. He
demanded him to stop drinking and to carry on home. The middle aged man watched
how the younger man approached the eldest. Towards the end, the middle aged man
had thought about what he experienced with the younger man's rudeness. You can
always tell a clean, empty place is a better place to drink alone, then a loud,
crowded one.
One main symbol in
the story is the young man. The young man in this story represents a rude
attitude, leaving a not so well thought about his generation. Instead of
telling the old man to scram in different words, he could've approached him
nicely and asked him to return home at the late hour to be safe.
Another symbol in
this story is the middle aged man. The middle aged man represents observing, on
how the young man treats the oldest man. He watched as the young man had forced
the oldest to stop drinking and didn't understand his need to be rude.
The symbolism can be
well recognized by some readers to help them understand the story a better. The
questions that the middle aged man had from his experience where answered. A
clean, quiet café is a much better place to stay, than a loud bar.