“A Clean, Well-Lighted Place” takes place in a café, revealing a simple conversation between a young and an older waiter regarding a regular old client. We learn the characteristics of those waiters through their conversations. One is young, energetic, confident, and very reluctant. While in comparison the other is an old, but wise, experienced, and sympathetic barman. As the story progresses, it reveals the message it is trying to get across its reader. The story is conveying how an old person differs as they age compared to a young person, through the different characters. As well as how a certain place is viewed by a certain person and has a different meaning to them.
Throughout different stages of our lives, we greatly change as a person.
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To one it is simply a place they reside in, they either love it or hate it. To another home is the place they hold dear, because that’s where their family is, that is where they grew up, that is where they find comfort. And most important of all, home is where one let themselves be free and won’t be judged. At the same time home can also be a disaster for another, such as residing with perhaps an abusive father or mother, or simply not being able to commit to that place. As I have mentioned earlier, certain places mean differently to a certain person, as we are all unique. In this short story, the author depicts this situation with the characters. Normally, someone would not consider hanging out at a café at one in the morning comfortable, especially with strangers. It is not safe, anything can happen, yet the old client and the barman found that café serene. It comforted them, gave them a place to escape their sleeping problems, or “insomnia,” as the old barman later assumes. Perhaps both those old man saw the café as their own house, since they had no one to go back to at their own house. The story further supports my point when it reveals that the old client has a good sum of money, therefore one can assume the old client maybe has a beautiful house. Yet he preferred a café at midnight, middle of nowhere with strangers. To others the café might be simply a place to do business. Though those old men found peace and comfort at that place, it held a special meaning to their
Voskuil writes, “His mother, distracted, had shut off the floodlights and he did not protest against the dark.” (468). The dark can mean many things symbolically, however for Gary it is a quiet place to sit and think about everything that happened that day. It had been a long sad day for everyone at the beach and Gary needed time to absorb everything he had seen and heard earlier. The dark can symbolize saddens or loss, or even loneliness. For Gary this night holds all of this. The sadness of losing the young boy to the currents of the ocean, the loss the family and friends of the boy feel, and the sadness they feel as well. Gary sits in the dark drinking his single malt because he does not mind being reminded of the events that occurred earlier that day, this is a way that lets him think it through for
Goodness verses evil is how most novels portray light verses dark. Marilynne Robinson challenges this idea in her novel Housekeeping by changing the roles of light and dark. Light, in her novel, represents a normal life as Lucille, the protagonist’s sister, chooses to endorse. Darkness is portrayed as a source of enlightenment and a path to an abnormal life which Ruth, the protagonist, and Sylvie, the protagonist’s aunt, embrace. In the novel Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson, the main characters, Ruth and Lucille, have to choose their lifestyle as a normal one in the light, or one that is unique in the dark.
The main focus of A Clean, Well-Lighted Place is on the pain of old age suffered by a man that we meet in a cafe late one night. Hemingway contrasts light and dark to show the difference between this man and the young people around him, and uses his deafness as an image of his separation from the rest of the world.
The author then uses darkness to describe the faces of the adults on Sunday evenings after dinner when everyone is relaxing with their own thought's. "For a moment nobody's talking but every face looks darkening, like the sky outside...The silence, the darkness coming and the darkness in the faces frighten the child obscurel...
The opening paragraph of the story contains a metaphorical passage: "I stared at it in the swinging light of the subway car, and in the faces and bodies of the people, and in my own face, trapped in the darkness which roared outside"(349). This reference is significant because it is a contrast to the dismal society that the narrator and his brother Sonny live in. The darkness is the portrayal of the community of Harlem that is trapped, in their surroundings by physical, economic, and social barriers. The obvious nature of darkness has overcome the occupants of the Harlem community. The narrator, an algebra teacher, observes a depressing similarity between his students and his brother, Sonny. This is true because the narrator is fearful for his students falling into a life of crime and drugs, as did his brother. The narrator notes that the cruel realities of the streets have taken away the possible light from the lives of his brother and his students. The narrator makes an insightful connection between the darkness that Sonny faced and the darkness that the young boys are presently facing. This is illustrated in the following quote:
Through symbolism the author shows us how Neddy goes from social drinking to destitution. Each stop at a neighbor’s pool gets progressively harder, but he keeps on. Neddy ignores these signs and becomes beaten and finally alone. This truly is a sad journey of a man who destroys himself through alcohol. As the story ends, Neddy realizes that he is alone. Will he change? Get help for his alcoholism? The author leaves us hanging, but at this point we know he is alone, everyone has abandoned him. Neddy has followed the stereotypical footsteps of an alcoholic.
The tone of the story is one of dread, sadness, and nervousness. The narrator in the story is a sad, paranoid and nervous character. His life seems to not be going that well, because he is living with the old man. The story doesn’t go into why the narrator was living there, but if you have a roommate your finances may be frayed.
The man, whose face we cannot see, is almost completely hidden in the dark shadows. Like the bird, this “night hawk” is camouflaged by the low light and shadows in such a way that he almost vanishes into the night. With his distance from the couple, the impression is that the man is mysterious, bad or even sinister. With the absence of a door, to the outside, the people seem to be trapped or isolated. The other buildings and sidewalks are also examples of subordination by the artist, de-emphasizing the importance of the surroundings so that the diner becomes the strongest focal point in the
In Hemingway’s “A Clean Well-Lighted Place”, the old wealthy man keeps ordering drinks. One of the employees of that restaurant mention...
The story of the “Encounter” expresses different images of light and dark. Thesituation of the image of the old man the two young boys come across on their journey. The adventure of the young boys leads to some confusion to what’s happening throughout their adventures. The boys were talking “with Leo Dillon and a boy named Mahony I planned a day’s miching”(13). The boys came up with plans to get out of school for their adventure. The boys headed out towards their destination; throughout their adventure they come across uncertainties. The boys come across the world that’s different than what they are used to, such as the old man. The old man seems very confusing for the young boys; the old man talks about young girls saying, “what nice soft hair they had and how soft their hands were and how all girls were not so good as they seemed to be if one only knew” (18). The boys were confused with the statements the old man was saying. Mahony said “he’s a queer old josser” (18). The images of the old man were very negative towards the boys adventure. ...
Kroeger, F. P. “The Dialogue in ‘A Clean, Well-Lighted Place’.” College English. 20.5 (1959): 240-241. JSTOR. Web. 8 Feb. 2014.
From mapping it is clear that the night represents death by meeting night, the narrator is saying that he encounters death. Thus, the idea of death is reinforced by the conceptual metaphor A LIFETIME IS A DAY and activates the general metaphor DEATH IS A JOURNEY TO A FINAL DESTINATION.
In 1933, Ernest Hemmingway wrote A Clean, Well-Lighted Place. It's a story of two waiters working late one night in a cafe. Their last customer, a lonely old man getting drunk, is their last customer. The younger waiter wishes the customer would leave while the other waiter is indifferent because he isn't in so much of a hurry. I had a definite, differentiated response to this piece of literature because in my occupation I can relate to both cafe workers.
The manager is put into the novel to show how the adaptation to uncivilized life can be very costly, while the poem exemplifies on that idea and that these “hollow men” are missing something vital to life. However both characters express the same uncaring personality, despite the fact that they unappreciated meaning and initiative, they seem to embrace that fact that everything happens for a reason and they accept it for the way it is.
The narrator wrestles with conflicting feelings of responsibility to the old man and feelings of ridding his life of the man's "Evil Eye" (34). Although afflicted with overriding fear and derangement, the narrator still acts with quasi-allegiance toward the old man; however, his kindness may stem more from protecting himself from suspicion of watching the old man every night than from genuine compassion for the old man.