1

Walter "Walt" Whitman May 31, 1819 March 26, 1892) was an American poet,
essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between
transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among
the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse.[1]
His work was very controversial in its time, particularly his poetry collection Leaves of
Grass, which was described as obscene for its overt sexuality.
Born in Huntington on Long Island, Whitman worked as a journalist, a teacher, a
government clerk, andin addition to publishing his poetrywas a volunteer nurse
during the American Civil War. Early in his career, he also produced a temperance novel,
Franklin Evans (1842). Whitman's major work, Leaves of Grass, was first published in
1855 with his own money. The work was an attempt at reaching out to the common
person with an American epic. He continued expanding and revising it until his death in
1892. After a stroke towards the end of his life, he moved to Camden, New Jersey, where
his health further declined. He died at age 72 and his funeral became a public spectacle.[2]
[3]

Whitman's sexuality is often discussed alongside his poetry. Though biographers continue
to debate his sexuality, he is usually described as either homosexual or bisexual in his
feelings and attractions. However, there is disagreement among biographers as to whether
Whitman had actual sexual experiences with men.[4]
Whitman was concerned with politics throughout his life. He supported the Wilmot
Proviso and opposed the extension of slavery generally. His poetry presented an
egalitarian view of the races, though his attitude in life reflected many of the racial
prejudices common to nineteenth-century America and his opposition to slavery was not
necessarily based on belief in the equality of races per se.[5] At one point he called for the
abolition of slavery, but later he saw the abolitionist movement as a threat to democracy.[

Type of Work and Year Written

"A Noiseless Patient Spider" is a lyric poem. Walt Whitman wrote the poem in the 1860s and
published it in the 1871-1872 edition of Leaves of Grass. Leaves of Grass was a continually
growing collection of his work that began with the publication of the first edition in 1855. The
version of the poem on this page is from the 1881-1882 edition of Leaves of Grass. Click here to
access all the editions of Leaves of Grass published before his death.

Themes
"A Noiseless Patient Spider" develops the following themes:
The quest, or exploration, for meaning and knowledge in the vastness of the universe.
The courage to venture forth alone into unknown territory.
The patience to build a plexus that links one stopping place to the next.
The perseverance to carry on until the gossamer thread (line 8) connects to a goal.

The Poem as a Metaphor

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The poem compares a spider to a human. Each creature tirelessly constructs bonds to its
surroundings. A spider spins silken thread to span a void. A human builds ships, airplanes,
bridges. Sometimes he crosses a void with a telescope (as Galileo did) or reaches new plateaus
of knowledge with a question (as Socrates did) or a theory (as Einstein did).

Structure
The poem contains two five-line stanzas, the first consisting of one long sentence. The subject is
the pronoun I (line 2), and the main verb is the compound mark'd (line 2) and mark'd (line 3). The
second stanza is one long group of words requiring I marked to be carried over unstated from the
first stanza in order to make the word group a complete sentence. If inserted, I marked would
occur after And (line 6) or soul (line 6). The poet achieves a measure of balance between the two
stanzas with the words unreeling and speeding in the first stanza and musing, venturing,
throwing, and seeking in the second stanza. He also balances isolated in the first stanza (line 1)
with detached in the second stanza (line 2) and vacant vast surrounding in the first stanza (line 2)
with measureless oceans of space in the second stanza (line 2).

Format: Free Verse

Whitman wrote "A Noiseless Patient Spider" in free versealso called vers libre, a French term.
Free verse generally has no metrical pattern or end rhyme. However, it may contain patterns of
another kind, such as repetition to impart emphasis, balance, and rhythm. For example,
Whitman's poem uses mark'd twice (lines 2 and 3), filament three times (line 4), O my soul twice
(lines 6 and 10), and till three times (lines 9 and 10). Free verse may also contain conventional
figures of speech. Among the figures of speech in "A Noiseless Patient Spider" are the following:

A Noiseless Patient Spider

From the 1891-1892 Edition of Leaves of Grass
By Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

Text
A noiseless patient spider,
I markd where on a little promontory1 it stood, isolated,
Markd how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,
It launchd forth filament, filament, filament, 2 out of itself,
Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them. 5
And you O my Soul where you stand,
Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,
Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,
Till the bridge you will need be formd, till the ductile 3 anchor hold,
Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my Soul. 10

Nj merimang qet durueshm,

I mark'd ku n nj kep t vogl qndronte, t izoluar,
Mark'd se si pr t eksploruar vakant madhe prreth,
Ajo launch'd radh fije e holl, fije e holl, fije e holl, prej vetvete,

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Ever unreeling tyre, ndonjher pa pushim shpejtimin e tyre.
Dhe ti o shpirti im ku ju qndroni,
Rrethuar, shkputur, n oqeane t pamatura t hapsirs,
Pa pushim musing, venturing, duke hedhur, duke krkuar sferat pr t lidhur ato,
Deri urs ju do t duhet t form'd, deri n pritje t ankorohen urt,
Deri fije fije merimange, ju prplas kapur diku, o shpirti im
Alliteration in line 3 (vacant vast), line 4 (forth filament, filament, filament), lines 6 and 7 (stand,
surrounded, detached).
Anaphora in lines 9 and 10 (repetition of till).
Apostrophe in the second stanza. (The speaker addresses his soul.)
Metaphor in the second stanza. (The speaker compares himself to a spider.)
Metaphor/Personification in the second stanza. (The speaker compares his soul to a person.)
Metaphors that compare the bond that the speaker forms to a bridge (line 9), the attachment he
forms to an anchor (line 9), and his exploration to a gossamer thread (line 10).

Leaves of Grass Summary

Leaves of Grass is a collection of poetry written over Walt Whitman's entire lifetime
organized thematically into sections. Whitman revised and added to the book throughout
his life, the final edition being published only months before his death in 1891. Whitman
was intentional in not organizing the book in any chronological way. Instead, he was
concerned with the journey of the poetry. He desired that the reader would see a self
formed through the words and themes of the book.
The opening section, "Inscriptions," gives the reader an overview of the work and the
purview of its author. Whitman names the subject of the work - "One's-self." This is not
only Whitman's self, though he certainly identifies himself as the hero of the epic, but it is
also the reader's self as well as a more encompassing democratic self. The subject, then,
is Whitman, the reader, and the nation. The themes of "Inscriptions" are as varied as the
themes of the entire book. He writes poems of a political, social, personal, and sexual
nature, all ideas that he will elaborate on in later sections.
"Starting from Paumanok" is a kind of road map for the literary work ahead. Whitman
understands the entire book as a journey and so he begins with his own beginnings of
self-awareness and poetic inspiration as a boy on Long Island, New York. Whitman
intends here to name those that will accompany him on his journey and he catalogs a vast
list of people and places that will play a part in his travels. His poems are of these people
and for these people. Whitman, however, is not just concerned with the physical but with
the spiritual as well. His own soul is named as a character in the book and his poems, he
says, are written with the soul in mind.
"Song of Myself" is a celebration of the individual. It is one of the book's original poems,
appearing in the first 1855 edition although it did not take its final form until the 1881
edition. Whitman does not call on religious methods or traditional institutions to help
create his self. Instead, Whitman becomes the quintessential modern man, created
through nature and created through his own journey of self discovery. In "Song of

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Myself," Whitman is creating his own poetic world and he is creating himself as a
character within that world. He encompasses both the basest desires of the human flesh
and the loftiest visions of the human soul. As he describes it, he becomes "multitudes."
"Calamus," one of the most controversial sections of the book because of its vivid
autoerotic and homosexual themes, moves from a celebration of the self to a celebration
of what Whitman terms "manly love." Whitman is chiefly concerned with the love that
men feel for each other. He means not just brotherly love, or familial love, but sexual
love as well. In "Calamus," Whitman seeks to become joined with another man in as
intimate a way as possible. The relationships that men feel for each other, he believes, is
incomplete until all facets of friendship are explored. It is only through these facets of
love that a person can come to understand the true nature of another person and the
meaning of another being. This is the basis for the democratic relationship and the purest
expression of it.
In the poem "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry," Whitman moves from the interpersonal
exploration of relationships to an exploration of the unity of the collective population.
While observing crowds of people crossing the river from Brooklyn into Manhattan,
Whitman gains a vision of the unity of all things. He knows that future generations will
feel the same feelings, ask the same questions, and contemplate the same thoughts that he
has while on this ferry ride. All people, in all time, are joined together in a great scheme.
Whitman does not attempt to name this scheme for he is not attempting to write
philosophy or theology. Instead, he only seeks for his reader to become joined with him;
to understand that they are unified through time and through the page.
Whitman lived through some of the most tumultuous years in the history of the United
States. He was a witness of, and participant in, the United States Civil War which lasted
from 1861 to 1865. Whitman chronicles this profound historic event in the sections
"Drum-Taps" and "Memories of President Lincoln." "Drum-Taps" begins with a
celebration of a call to arms. Whitman sees the promise of democracy as yet unfulfilled,
chiefly because of the injustice of slavery and the inability of America's population to
achieve its hope of individuality. The Civil War was an antidote to this evil. As the war
draws on, however, Whitman's tone becomes less celebratory. Death becomes the reality
and Whitman laments at brothers killing brothers. The summation of this death is the
killing of Abraham Lincoln, the man that Whitman saw as a model of leadership and
greatness. In his most famous poem, "O Captain! My Captain!," Whitman compares
Lincoln to the fallen captain of a ship that has come through much trial and tribulation.
He encourages the country to sing for its victory, but he admits that he can only mourn
for the fallen leader.
The closing sections of Leaves of Grass seek to reassess the themes and motifs of the
previous sections while continuing the journey of discovery and exploration of the self.
"Autumn Rivulets" and "From Noon to Starry Nights" can be seen as a halfway mark on
Whitman's own artistic and physical journey through life. He has a clear understanding
and view of death, now, yet he also seeks for his own work to become inspired with the
light of his previous years. In all things of nature, he understands that even death is a

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regeneration of life, just as autumn leaves fall and grow again in the spring. Whitman
ends his work with "Songs of Parting." He is not saying a permanent goodbye to the
reader, however. Even death is a part of the journey. Whitman encourages the reader to
see his book not as a book, but as a chronicle of a life. It is a life that the reader can live
as well and, in this way, Whitman lives on just as does the reader.

"Song of Myself"
Summary
Whitman begins this poem by naming its subject himself. He says that he celebrates
himself and that all parts of him are also parts of the reader. He is thirty-seven years old
and in perfect health and begins his journey Hoping to cease not till death. He puts
all Creeds and schools in abeyance hoping to set out on his own, though he admits he
will not forget these things. Whitman then describes a house in which the shelves are /
crowded with perfumes and he breathes in the fragrance though he refuses to let himself
become intoxicated with it. Instead, he seeks to go to the bank by the wood and become
naked and undisguised where he can hear all of nature around him.
Whitman says that he has heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the / beginning
and the end, but he refuses to talk of either. Instead, he rejects talk of the past or future
for an experience in the now. This is the urge of the world which calls to him. Whitman
sees all the things around him The latest dates, discoveries, inventions, societies,
authors old / and new, but he knows that they are not the Me myself. He remembers in
his own past that he once sweated through fog with fashionable arguments. He no
longer holds these pretensions, however.
Whitman then describes an encounter between his body and soul. He invites his soul to
loafe with me on the grass and to lull him with its valved voice. He tells his soul to
settle upon him, your head athwart my hips and gently turnd / over upon me.. He
invites his soul to undress him and reach inside him until the soul feels his feet. This will
bring him perfect peace that pass all the argument of the earth. This peace is the
promise of God and is what allows all people to become his brothers and sisters.
Whitman recalls a scene in which a child came to him with a handful of grass and asked
him what it was. Whitman has no answer for the child. The grass is the flag of my
disposition and it is the handkerchief of the Lord. It is also the child or a symbol for
all of humanity. Whitman sees the grass sprouting from the chests of young men, the
heads of old women, and the beards of old men. He remembers all those that have died
and recalls that each sprout of grass is a memorial to those that have come before.
Whitman reflects that to die is different from what any one supposed, and / luckier.
Whitman then writes a parable. Twenty-eight young men bathe on a sea shore while a
young woman, richly drest hides behind the blinds of her house on the waters bank.

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She observes the men and finds that she loves the homeliest of them. She then goes down
to the beach to bathe with them, though the men do not see her. An unseen hand also
passes over the bodies of the young men but the young men do not think of who holds
onto them or whom they souse with spray.
Whitman describes groups of people that he stops to observe. The first is a butcher-boy
sharpening his knife and dancing. He sees the blacksmiths taking on their grimy work
with precision. Whitman then observes a negro as he works a team of horses at a
construction site. Whitman admires his chiseled body and his polishd and perfect
limbs. He sees and loves this picturesque giant. He admits in the next poem that he
is enamourdOf men that live among cattle or taste of the ocean or woods, / Of the
builders and steerers of ships and the wielders of axes / and mauls / I can eat and sleep
with them week in and week out. In a lengthy section, Whitman describes the work of
all people of the land the carpenter, the duck-shooter, the deacons of the church, the
farmers, the machinist, and many more. They often have hard, ordinary lives, yet
Whitman proclaims that these people tend inward to me, and I tend outward to them
and they all weave the song of myself.
Whitman describes himself as old and young and foolish as much aswise. He is
Maternal as well as paternal, a child as well as a man. He is of all the land of North
America from the South even into Canada. He notes that these are not his own original
thoughts, however. These thoughts have been a part of the human condition for all of
time. These thoughts are the grass that grows wherever the land isthe common air that
bathes the globe. His thoughts are for all people, even those that society has considered
outcasts.
Whitman wonders why he should adhere to the old ways prayer or ceremony. He claims
that he has pried through the strata, analyzed to a hair and found that nothing is as true
and sweet as my own bones. Whitman understands himself. He is august and
vindicated by his own nature. I exist as I am, that is, enough. He does not have to
explain his inconsistencies. Those are only to be accepted. Do I contradict myself? /
Very well then I contradict myself, / (I am large, I contain multitudes.) All pleasure and
all pain are found within his own self. Whitman describes himself in the basest terms:
Turbulent, fleshy, sensual, eating, drinking and breeding, he does not feign interest in
manners. He hears the primeval voices of democracy and mankind and gives himself
over to these forbidden lusts. Above all, Whitman says, I believe in the flesh and the
appetites.
Analysis
The first thing to note is that Whitman calls his poems songs. This insinuates that
Whitman feels there is an audible quality to his work; that the true meanings of his poems
will not be understood if they are not heard by a listener. Thus, Whitman feels as though
he will not be understood as an individual if he is not heard by the world. Song of
Myself, as the linchpin of this first half of Leaves of Grass, is his attempt to make
himself heard.

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Whitmans subject is himself, but it is clear that Whitman means more than just his
physical self. Whitman calls himself a universe of meanings. He uses the symbol of his
naked self in nature to symbolize his own fusion with the world around him. Whitmans
self is the whole of America and the whole of nature. This is best seen in Whitmans use
of the catalog. A catalog is a literary device used in epic poetry as a rhetorical naming or
inventory. Whitman uses a catalog in Song of Myself to name a variety of professions
and people that he meets on his journey across the States. He says that he becomes part of
these people and these people come to compose his own self.
In this section, Whitman first engages the idea of individuality and collectivity. The
catalog is Whitmans example of the collective. This refers back to his opening
inscription in which Whitman proclaimed that his work is of the self, both the individual
self and the democratic self. The collection of all people in the land forms a self that is
distinct from the individual self, yet is similar in that it has its own soul and being.
Whitman uses the metaphor of grass in the sixth section of Songs of Myself to try and
explain the democratic self. His explanation, he admits, is incomplete. Whitman describes
a child coming to him and asking him what is the grass. He has no real answer, meaning
that he cannot fully describe the democratic self to those that do not inherently
understand it. Whitman can only tell the child that he sees the democratic self in young
men and old women, meaning that he sees it in all people. Whitman then takes the
metaphor one step farther, telling the child that even the grass that has died and has gone
back to the earth is a part of the whole. Song of Myself balances the themes of
individuality and collectivity as two important ingredients for the democratic experiment
of America. This is Whitmans political argument.
Whitman breaks up Song of Myself with a kind of parable. A parable is a short,
succinct story that offers a moral or instructive lesson for its hearers. Whitmans lesson is
an erotic one and it is instructive to see how Whitmans passion for democracy is equated
with a sexual and erotic passion. A woman sees twenty-eight men bathing and lusts to be
with them. When she joins them, they are together through the power of an unseen
hand. Whitman uses shocking erotic images of the men and spraying water, a reference
to male ejaculation, to arouse the reader. Whitman is telling his readers that they must not
only observe the democratic life but they must become one with it. This joining is both
mysterious and erotic for those that take part.
Whitman closes Song of Myself by trying to name this large, democratic collectivity,
yet he finds it impossible. He makes a point to let the reader know that he contradicts
himself and that this democratic self is full of inconsistencies. Whitman understands very
well that the democracy of America is imperfect, filled with injustice, self-serving, and
undermined by the tyranny of the individual. He pares this democratic self down to its
essentials: it is primal, the flesh and the appetites. Whitman continues Leaves of Grass
with this carnal vision in the next sections.

"Drum-Taps"

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Summary
The prelude to Drum Taps is an ode to New York, Whitmans home. He sings an ode to
the city for being the first ones to arms when the duties of war called. The city, he reports,
did not hesitate to send its men to war. Whitman recounts how he had seen soldiers
parading through the city for forty years, but with news from the south A shock
electric, the young men, the lawyers, the judges, the drivers, the salesmen, and squads of
other common or noble men took up arms and marched to war. Whitman loves each of
these men for their bravery and willingness to take up a manly life in the camp.
Mannahatta smiles for all its men.
Whitman then imagines the year 1861 as a soldier, marching into battle. No dainty
rhymes or sentimental love verses will describe this year. Whitman can only imagine the
year as a strong man erect, clothed in blue clothes, advancing, / carrying a rifle on your
shoulder. He sees the year as one of Manhattans city dwellers and he sees this year
move across the West, into the Mid-West, through Pennsylvania and into Tennessee and
Chattanooga. 1861 is a hurrying, crashing, sad, distracted year.
In his call to arms, Beat! Beat! Drums!, Whitman calls on the sounds of drums and
bugles to pierce every silent place, to leave no person undisturbed with their noise. They
must disturb the churches, the schools, the farms, and those that are in love. If anyone
tries to do anything resembling normal life if the brokers and speculators continue their
trade, if the lawyers attempt to argue a case in court, or if a singer attempts to sing they
must be drowned out by the sound of the drums and the bugles. They must rattle
quicker, heavier drums you bugles wilder blow.
Song of the Banner at Daybreak is a beck and call between a poet, a Banner and
Pennant, a father, and a child. The poet begins the poem by announcing that his new
song, a free song, flies freely in the open air along side the flapping banner and pennant.
The poet will weave the chord and twine in, / Mans desire and babes desire and will
give powerful verse to inspire those that hear it. The pennant cries out to the poet and to
the child to come up here and to fly in the clouds and winds. The child wants to
know what it is that calls out to him from the sky, but the father tells the child that it is
nothing. The valuable things, he points out, are the dazzling things in the houses and in
the stores, the vehicles preparing to crawl along the streets / with goods. These are
the things that the earth envies. The child cries to the father that the banner and pennant
call out, that it is alive and full of people. The father hushes the child and says to only
behold the well-prepared pavements and to mark the solid- / walld houses. The
banner and pennant cry to the bard to speak to the child and to all children. They ask if
they are mere strips of cloth profiting nothings, / Only flapping in the wind?
The poet replies that he does not see only strips of cloth. Instead, he hears the tramp of
armiesthe jubilant shouts of millions of men. The banner and pennant cry out for
liberty. The poet says that he has seen the results of peace, the great economic and social
profit of the thirty eight states. The pennant represents war, however, and now the
halyards have raisd it and peace has been discarded over all the sea and land. The

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banner and the pennant cry for the poet to go louder, higher, stronger in his song. They
ask the bard to show the children that they do not represent wealth and prosperity alone,
but also war and death supreme.
The child tells the father that he does not like the money or the houses, only the banner
and pennant flying high above it all. This anguishes the father, for he knows that these
pennants are symbols of death and calls for the child to go and fight. The poet declares
that he now understands the meaning of the banner and the pennant because a child
taught him. They are not houses of peace or prosperity; they are also symbols of the
destruction of the houses and the prosperity. The poet declares that he will sing only of
this banner and pennant flying high over the country.
Whitman has an answer for war in Over the Carnage Rose Prophetic a Voice. He says
that, in the end, affection will solve the problems of freedom. Through love, the
nation will become one again and Columbia will be victorious. Whitman mocks those
that think the answer to the conflict of war will be found in lawyers, or an agreement
on a paperor by arms Only through partnership and the love of lovers will there
be unity. In the poem Reconciliation, Whitmans tone is low and sad. He regrets that
my enemy is dead, a man divine as myself is dead The realities of war have eternal
consequences.
Analysis
Whitman wrote the majority of Drum-Taps in 1865, just before the end of the
American Civil War and before President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. Whitman
had mentioned in several previous sections of Leaves of Grass that for all the promise
that he saw in the democratic American experiment, it was still only promise. Injustice,
especially in the form of Southern slavery, meant that all persons were not able to
experience the true forms of individuality that made collective freedom a reality. The
Civil War changed this idea for Whitman and Drum-Taps is both his chronicle of this
bloody war and his understanding of how the promise of America changed because of the
war.
There is no fixed tone to Drum-Taps. Whitman begins in a celebratory mode. He exalts
the bravery and willingness to fight of the residents of New York. These celebratory
poems seem to mirror an excitement in the nation as a whole that evil would be overcome
by good. As Drum-Taps moves forward, the reader can sense the passage of time in war
as well. Whitman provides scenes of war and what he sees is not often celebratory. 1861
is a particularly difficult year; January, 1861 saw the secession of most of the Confederate
states from the Union. The attack on Fort Sumter, South Carolina, occurred in April. By
that summer, the first major battles of the war had begun and it was apparent that there
would be no easy victory. Whitmans poems take on this darker tone.
An important theme from Drum-Taps is the idea that war is all-encompassing. He
writes in Beat! Beat! Drums! that the sounds of battle awaken and disturb all. No
institution of society is left untouched by the duty of just war. Drum-Taps, perhaps,

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comes closest to naming the anxiety that Whitman feels for his country and for his
society. In this section, he does not laud the common working man but, instead, calls out
those that would rather be busied by their trade than fight for their freedoms. Whitmans
gentler message is discarded here for a fervent and urgent one. All people of America
(Whitman is specifically addressing the Northern Union) must come together to ensure
that the promise of democracy.
Whitman uses several poems in a narrative mode in order to help tell the story of the
country during the war. One such poem is Song of the Banner at Daybreak. Whitman
uses the personification of battle flags to elaborate on a national conversation taking
place during the war between people and generations. The tension is between the
comforts of consumerism and the calls of national duty, or patriotism. The father of the
poem seeks to shelter his son from the harsh reality of war, and from death, by
encouraging his son to avoid patriotic callings. The world, the father says, wants only the
goods and advancements won by democracy. The banner and the pennant, however,
understand that comfort is won only through bloodshed. The poet, therefore, becomes the
intermediary, explaining to the boy the meaning of patriotic duty. This is undoubtedly the
role in which Whitman cast himself. He became an explainer of patriotic duty to those
that would prefer comfort they did not fight for.
As the war ends, Whitmans tone turns more somber. He understands the price that has
been paid by all those who have fought. He thinks repeatedly of death in these closing
poems, best exemplified by Reconciliation. The proud and celebratory tone of these
early poems is muted. He uses the feminine personification of America by calling her
Columbia. This calque on the word America is used in order to reinstate the sense of
adventurous promise that had been put on hold during the war. Whitman attempts to
balance the ending of Drum-Taps with a somber reflection on the life that was taken in
order for the promise of democracy to once again flourish.
1.
O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done!
The ship has weathered every wrack, the prize we sought is won.
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring.
But, O heart! heart! heart!
Leave you not the little spot
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

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2.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells!
Rise up! for you the flag is flung, for you the bugle trills:
For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths; for you the shores a-crowding:
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning.
O Captain! dear father!
This arm I push beneath you.
It is some dream that on the deck
You've fallen cold and dead!
3.
My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still:
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will.
But the ship, the ship is anchored safe, its voyage closed and done:
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won!
Exult, O shores! and ring, O bells!
But I, with silent tread,
Walk the spot my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.

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Emily Dickinson's Collected Poems Summary

Emily Dickinson wrote almost 1800 poems during her life. Her poetry was stunningly
original, ignoring or working against many of the traditions and conventions of the time.
Her poems are almost all short, using the traditional hymnal stanza of quatrains of lines
alternating between four and three beats long, rhymed abab.
Dickinsons poems use largely simple language, many off-rhymes, and unconventional
punctuation to deal with a small set of themes that she returned to again and again. Death,
grief, passion, faith, truth, and fame and success are the most prominent of these themes.
Each time she revisits one of these threads, she comes at it differently, never allowing her
interpretation of truth to become entrenched or oversimplified.

"I'm Nobody! Who are you?"

This poem opens with a literally impossible declarationthat the speaker is Nobody.
This nobody-ness, however, quickly comes to mean that she is outside of the public
sphere; perhaps, here Dickinson is touching on her own failure to become a published
poet, and thus the fact that to most of society, she is Nobody.
The speaker does not seem bitter about thisinstead she asks the reader, playfully, Who
are you?, and offers us a chance to be in cahoots with her (Are you Nobody Too?).
In the next line, she assumes that the answer to this question is yes, and so unites herself
with the reader (Then theres a pair of us!), and her use of exclamation points shows
that she is very happy to be a part of this failed couple.
Dickinson then shows how oppressive the crowd of somebodies can be, encouraging the
reader to keep this a secret (Dont tell!) because otherwise theyd advertise, and the
speaker and her reader would lose their ability to stand apart from the crowd.
It then becomes abundantly clear that it is not only preferable to be a Nobody, it is
dreary to be a Somebody. These somebodies, these public figures who are so unlike
Dickinson, are next compared to frogs, rather pitifully, we can imagine, croaking away to
the admiring Bog. These public figures do not even attempt to say anything of
importanceall they do is tell ones name, that is, their own name, over and over, in an
attempt to make themselves seem important.
This admiring Bog represents those people who allow the public figures to think they
are important, the general masses who lift them up. These masses are not even granted
the respect of having a sentient being to represent them. Instead, they are something into
which one sinks, which takes all individuality away, and has no opinion to speak of, and
certainly not one to be respected.

Analysis

13
Im Nobody! Who are you? is an example of one of Dickinsons more comical poems,
yet the comedy is not simply for pleasure. Rather, it contains a biting satire of the public
sphere, both of the public figures who benefit from it, and of the masses who allow them
to. Dickinsons light tone, childish voice, and invitation to the reader to be on her side,
however, keep the sharp edge of the satire from cutting too stingingly.
This poem mocks the pretensions of the public world, as it imagines public figures---or
perhaps, published writersas loud bullfrogs. These frogs have nothing of import to say;
instead, they advertise their own names, over and over, selling themselves for the purpose
of maintaining their fame, but not having any substance behind it. This especially makes
it seem like this poem is speaking towards Dickinsons lack of publication, as even when
she did publish, she did so anonymously, avoiding the prospect of telling her name.
The frogs are not the only ones at fault, however. Their audienceclosely tied to them
through rhymeis an admiring Bog, with all of its members having joined into the
whole, losing all individuality or identity. And indeed, this whole is a swamp, something
that sucks one in, or sucks in all they are told, but puts forward no opinion or judgment of
its own. This audience thus is spared the dreariness of being somebody, for they have
no identity, but they become worthless, for they are without opinion, and only serve to
listen to and support the public figures.
This public sphere is not only unpleasant in itself, but it is also tries to impose itself on
those nobodies, like the speaker and ostensibly the reader, who do their best to avoid it.
The speaker fears that even telling anyone that there is now a pair of us, that is,
nobodies, outsiders, will lead to their very identities being advertised, and thus taken
from them, for they will no longer be able to be the anonymous, free-thinking nobodies
that they have chosen to be.
In the world of this poem, then, the public sphere is about advertised or self-advertised
identities: people marketing their names and their existence. This marketing becomes the
only way for anyone to enter the public sphere. Talent itself is inconsequential, and thus
for someone like Dickinson, or, ostensibly, the reader, who desires to think and to
perform with meaning, rather than just maintaining their own fame, participation or
recognition in this public world is impossible.

14

Robert Frost
1874-1963 , San Francisco , CA
Robert Frost was born on March 26, 1874, in San Francisco, where his father, William
Prescott Frost Jr., and his mother, Isabelle Moodie, had moved from Pennsylvania shortly
after marrying. After the death of his father from tuberculosis when Frost was eleven
years old, he moved with his mother and sister, Jeanie, who was two years younger, to
Lawrence, Massachusetts. He became interested in reading and writing poetry during his
high school years in Lawrence, enrolled at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New
Hampshire, in 1892, and later at Harvard University in Boston, though he never earned a
formal college degree.
Frost drifted through a string of occupations after leaving school, working as a teacher,
cobbler, and editor of the Lawrence Sentinel. His first published poem, My Butterfly,"
appeared on November 8, 1894, in the New York newspaper The Independent.
In 1895, Frost married Elinor Miriam White, whom hed shared valedictorian honors
with in high school and who was a major inspiration for his poetry until her death in
1938. The couple moved to England in 1912, after they tried and failed at farming in New
Hampshire. It was abroad that Frost met and was influenced by such contemporary
British poets as Edward Thomas, Rupert Brooke, and Robert Graves. While in England,
Frost also established a friendship with the poet Ezra Pound, who helped to promote and
publish his work.
By the time Frost returned to the United States in 1915, he had published two full-length
collections, A Boys Will (Henry Holt and Company, 1913) and North of Boston (Henry
Holt and Company, 1914), and his reputation was established. By the 1920s, he was the
most celebrated poet in America, and with each new bookincluding New Hampshire
(Henry Holt and Company, 1923), A Further Range (Henry Holt and Company, 1936),
Steeple Bush (Henry Holt and Company, 1947), and In the Clearing (Holt Rinehart &
Winston, 1962)his fame and honors (including four Pulitzer Prizes) increased.
Though his work is principally associated with the life and landscape of New England
and though he was a poet of traditional verse forms and metrics who remained steadfastly
aloof from the poetic movements and fashions of his timeFrost is anything but merely
a regional poet. The author of searching and often dark meditations on universal themes,
he is a quintessentially modern poet in his adherence to language as it is actually spoken,
in the psychological complexity of his portraits, and in the degree to which his work is
infused with layers of ambiguity and irony.
In a 1970 review of The Poetry of Robert Frost, the poet Daniel Hoffman describes
Frosts early work as the Puritan ethic turned astonishingly lyrical and enabled to say out
loud the sources of its own delight in the world," and comments on Frosts career as The
American Bard: He became a national celebrity, our nearly official Poet Laureate, and a

15
great performer in the tradition of that earlier master of the literary vernacular, Mark
Twain.
About Frost, President John F. Kennedy, at whose inauguration the poet delivered a
poem, said, He has bequeathed his nation a body of imperishable verse from which
Americans will forever gain joy and understanding.
Robert Frost lived and taught for many years in Massachusetts and Vermont, and died in
Boston on January 29, 1963.
Nothing Gold can stay
The meaning of the poem is that the things that are most beautiful in life are also the
things that have the shortest lives. He says the first leaves of nature are their most
beautiful and that Eden was the most beautiful place to live. Neither of these beautiful
things survived.
I think the clearest illustration of this in the novel is Johnny's death. He was gold for a
brief while, but then died. On a more hopeful note, it seems that maybe Ponyboy will be
different. Maybe he will actually stay gold. We get this hope at the end of the book
because (instead of going and fighting or anything like that) he turns to writing as an
outlet for his emotions.
So Johnny was not able to stay gold, but maybe Ponyboy can.

Fire and Ice Summary

The speaker brings us into the middle of an argument between people who think the
world will come to a fiery end and people who think the world will freeze. He could be
talking about the literal end of the world, but he's also talking about the power that human
beings have to harm or "destroy" one another.
The speaker's experience with romantic desire has taught him that passionate or "hot"
emotions like love and lust would probably have the power to turn the earth into a big
fireball. But he has also experienced the other extreme, and he knows that colder
emotions like hate have great destructive power. Love gets all the publicity, but hate is
the silent killer. It may not have the same grandeur as the fireball ending, but it'll do the
trick.

16
The road not taken
Our speaker has come to a fork in a path in the woods. It's fall, and the leaves are turning
colors. He's unsure which way to go, and wishes he could go both ways. He looks down
one path as far as he can see, but then he decides to take the other. He thinks the path he
decides to take is not quite as worn as the other one, but really, the paths are about the
same, and the fallen leaves on both look pretty fresh.
The speaker reflects on how he plans to take the road that he didn't take another day, but
suspects that he probably won't ever come back. Instead, far off in the future, he'll be
talking about how his decision was final and life changing.

17

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald

Francis Scott Key Fitzgerald was a Jazz Age novelist and short story writer who is
considered to be among the greatest twentieth-century American writers. Born on
September 24, 1896, he was the only son of an aristocratic father and a provincial,
working-class mother. He was the product of two divergent traditions: while his father's
family included the author of "The Star-Spangled Banner" (after whom Fitzgerald was
named), his mother's family was, in Fitzgerald's own words, "straight 1850 potato-famine
Irish." As a result of this contrast, he was exceedingly ambivalent toward the notion of
the American dream: for him, it was at once vulgar and dazzlingly promising.
Like the central character of The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald had an intensely romantic
imagination; he once called it "a heightened sensitivity to the promises of life." The
events of Fitzgerald's own life can be seen as a struggle to realize those promises.
He attended both St. Paul Academy (1908-10) and Newman School (1911-13), where his
intensity and outsized enthusiasm made him unpopular with the other students. Later, at
Princeton University, he came close to the brilliant success of which he dreamed. He
became part of the influential Triangle Club, a dramatic organization whose members
were taken from the cream of society. He also became a prominent figure in the literary
life of the university and made lifelong friendships with Edmund Wilson and John Peale
Bishop. Despite these social coups, Fitzgerald struggled academically, and he eventually
flunked out of Princeton. In November 1917, he joined the army.
While stationed at Camp Sheridan (near Montgomery, Alabama), he met Zelda Sayre, the
daughter of an Alabama Supreme Court judge, and the two fell deeply in love. Fitzgerald
needed to improve his dismal financial circumstances, however, before he and Zelda
could marry. At the first opportunity, he left for New York, determined to make his
fortune in the great city. Instead, he was forced to take a menial advertising job at $90 per
month. Zelda broke their engagement, and Fitzgerald retreated to St. Paul, Minnesota.
There, he rewrote a novel that he had begun at Princeton. In the spring of 1920 the novel,
This Side of Paradise, was published.
Though today's readers might find its ideas dated, This Side of Paradise was a revelation
to Fitzgerald's contemporaries. It was regarded as a rare glimpse into the morality and
immorality of America's youth, and it made Fitzgerald famous. Suddenly, the author
could publish not only in prestigious literary magazines such as Scribner's but also highpaying, popular publications including The Saturday Evening Post.
Flush with his new wealth and fame, Fitzgerald finally married Zelda. The celebrated
columnist Ring Lardner christened them "the prince and princess of their generation."
Though the Fitzgeralds reveled in their notoriety, they also found it frightening, a fact
which is perhaps represented in the ending of Fitzgerald's second novel. This novel, The
Beautiful and Damned, was published two years later, and tells the story of a handsome

18
young man and his beautiful wife, who gradually deteriorate into careworn middle age
while they wait for the young man to inherit a large fortune. In a predictable ironic twist,
they only receive their inheritance when it is too late.
To escape this grim fate, the Fitzgeralds (together with their daughter, Frances, who was
born in 1921) moved in 1924 to the Riviera, where they became part of a group of
wealthy American expatriates whose style was largely determined by Gerald and Sara
Murphy. Fitzgerald described this society in his last completed novel, Tender is the Night,
and modeled its hero on Gerald Murphy. Meanwhile, Fitzgerald's reputation as a heavy
drinker tarnished his reputation in the literary world; he was viewed as an irresponsible
writer despite his painstaking revisions numerous drafts of his work.
Shortly after their relocation to France, Fitzgerald completed his most famous and
respected novel, The Great Gatsby (1925). Fitzgerald's own divided nature can be seen in
the contrast between the novel's hero, Jay Gatsby, and its narrator, Nick Carraway. The
former represents the naive Midwesterner dazzled by the possibilities of the American
dream; the latter represents the compassionate Princeton gentleman who cannot help but
regard that dream with suspicion. The Great Gatsby may be described as the most
profoundly American novel of its time; Fitzgerald connects Gatsby's dream, his "Platonic
conception of himself," with the aspirations of the founders of America.
A year later, Fitzgerald published a collection of short stories, All the Sad Young Men.
This book marks the end of the most productive period of Fitzgerald's life; the next
decade was full of chaos and misery. Fitzgerald began to drink excessively, and Zelda
began a slow descent into madness. In 1930, she suffered her first mental breakdown. Her
second breakdown, from which she never fully recovered, came in 1932.
Throughout the 1930s the Fitzgeralds fought an ultimately unsuccessful battle to save
their marriage. This struggle was tremendously debilitating for Fitzgerald; he later said
that he "left [his] capacity for hoping on the little roads that led to Zelda's sanitarium." He
did not finish his next novel, Tender is the Night, until 1934. It is the story of a
psychiatrist who marries one of his patients, and, as she slowly recovers, she exhausts his
vitality until he is "a man used up." This book, the last that Fitzgerald ever completed,
was considered technically faulty and was commercially unsuccessful. It has since gained
a reputation, however, as Fitzgerald's most moving work.
Crushed by the failure of Tender is the Night and his despair over Zelda, Fitzgerald
became an incurable alcoholic. In 1937, however, he managed to acquire work as a
script-writer in Hollywood. There he met and fell in love with Sheilah Graham, a famous
Hollywood gossip columnist. For the rest of his life, though he frequently had drunken
spells in which he became bitter and violent, Fitzgerald lived quietly with Ms. Graham.
Occasionally he went east to visit Zelda or his daughter Frances, who entered Vassar
College in 1938.
In October 1939, Fitzgerald began a novel about Hollywood titled The Last Tycoon. The
career of its hero, Monroe Stahr, is based on that of the renowned Hollywood producer

19
Irving Thalberg. On December 21, 1940, Fitzgerald suffered a fatal heart attack, leaving
the novel unfinished. Even in its half-completed state, The Last Tycoon is considered the
equal of the rest of Fitzgerald's work for its intensity.
Many of his short stories allowed Fitzgerald to explore ideas and situations which were
later reworked in to his longer fiction. Descriptions of setting which were devised in
Fitzgerald's 1922 story "Winter Dreams" became part of the detail of Daisy's home in The
Great Gatsby. Similarly, Fitzgerald also used inspirations from his 1927 story "Jacob's
Ladder" as character ideas for Tender Is the Night.
Fitzgerald often rejected his short fiction as 'trash', saying that the stories he wrote were
merely to fund the Fitzgerald's lavish lifestyle. His stories were indeed enough to sustain
the Fitzgerald family - his highest single story fee was $4000. The stories were far from
trash, however, and have been reproduced in collections many times. "The Curious Case
of Benjamin Button" was made in to a feature film in 2008.

The Great Gatsby Summary

While The Great Gatsby is a highly specific portrait of American society during the
Roaring Twenties, its story is also one that has been told hundreds of times, and is
perhaps as old as America itself: a man claws his way from rags to riches, only to find
that his wealth cannot afford him the privileges enjoyed by those born into the upper
class. The central character is Jay Gatsby, a wealthy New Yorker of indeterminate
occupation. Gatsby is primarily known for the lavish parties he throws each weekend at
his ostentatious Gothic mansion in West Egg. He is suspected of being involved in illegal
bootlegging and other underworld activities.
The narrator, Nick Carraway, is Gatsby's neighbor in West Egg. Nick is a young man
from a prominent Midwestern family. Educated at Yale, he has come to New York to
enter the bond business. In some sense, the novel is Nick's memoir, his unique view of
the events of the summer of 1922; as such, his impressions and observations necessarily
color the narrative as a whole. For the most part, he plays only a peripheral role in the
events of the novel; he prefers to remain a passive observer.
Upon arriving in New York, Nick visits his cousin, Daisy Buchanan, and her husband,
Tom. The Buchanans live in the posh Long Island district of East Egg; Nick, like Gatsby,
resides in nearby West Egg, a less fashionable area looked down upon by those who live
in East Egg. West Egg is home to the nouveau riche, people who lack established social
connections, and who tend to vulgarly flaunt their wealth. Like Nick, Tom Buchanan
graduated from Yale, and comes from a privileged Midwestern family. Tom is a former
football player, a brutal bully obsessed with the preservation of class boundaries. Daisy,
by contrast, is an almost ghostlike young woman who affects an air of sophisticated
boredom. At the Buchanans's, Nick meets Jordan Baker, a beautiful young woman with a
cold, cynical manner. The two later become romantically involved.

20
Jordan tells Nick that Tom has been having an affair with Myrtle Wilson, a woman who
lives in the valley of ashes, an industrial wasteland outside of New York City. After
visiting Tom and Daisy, Nick goes home to West Egg; there, he sees Gatsby gazing at a
mysterious green light across the bay. Gatsby stretches his arms out toward the light, as
though to catch and hold it.
Tom Buchanan takes Nick into New York, and on the way they stop at the garage owned
by George Wilson. Wilson is the husband of Myrtle, with whom Tom has been having an
affair. Tom tells Myrtle to join them later in the city. Nearby, on an enormous billboard, a
pair of bespectacled blue eyes stares down at the barren landscape. These eyes once
served as an advertisement; now, they brood over all that occurs in the valley of ashes.
In the city, Tom takes Nick and Myrtle to the apartment in Morningside Heights at which
he maintains his affair. There, they have a lurid party with Myrtle's sister, Catherine, and
an abrasive couple named McKee. They gossip about Gatsby; Catherine says that he is
somehow related to Kaiser Wilhelm, the much-despised ruler of Germany during World
War I. The more she drinks, the more aggressive Myrtle becomes; she begins taunting
Tom about Daisy, and he reacts by breaking her nose. The party, unsurprisingly, comes to
an abrupt end.
Nick Carraway attends a party at Gatsby's mansion, where he runs into Jordan Baker. At
the party, few of the attendees know Gatsby; even fewer were formally invited. Before
the party, Nick himself had never met Gatsby: he is a strikingly handsome, slightly
dandified young man who affects an English accent. Gatsby asks to speak to Jordan
Baker alone; after talking with Gatsby for quite a long time, she tells Nick that she has
learned some remarkable news. She cannot yet share it with him, however.
Some time later, Gatsby visits Nick's home and invites him to lunch. At this point in the
novel, Gatsby's origins are unclear. He claims to come from a wealthy San Francisco
family, and says that he was educated at Oxford after serving in the Great War (during
which he received a number of decorations). At lunch, Gatsby introduces Nick to his
business associate, Meyer Wolfsheim. Wolfhsheim is a notorious criminal; many believe
that he is responsible for fixing the 1919 World Series.
Gatsby mysteriously avoids the Buchanans. Later, Jordan Baker explains the reason for
Gatsby's anxiety: he had been in love with Daisy Buchanan when they met in Louisville
before the war. Jordan subtly intimates that he is still in love with her, and she with him.
Gatsby asks Nick to arrange a meeting between himself and Daisy. Gatsby has
meticulously planned their meeting: he gives Daisy a carefully rehearsed tour of his
mansion, and is desperate to exhibit his wealth and possessions. Gatsby is wooden and
mannered during this initial meeting; his dearest dreams have been of this moment, and
so the actual reunion is bound to disappoint. Despite this, the love between Gatsby and
Daisy is revived, and the two begin an affair.

21
Eventually, Nick learns the true story of Gatsby's past. He was born James Gatz in North
Dakota, but had his name legally changed at the age of seventeen. The gold baron Dan
Cody served as Gatsby's mentor until his death. Though Gatsby inherited nothing of
Cody's fortune, it was from him that Gatsby was first introduced to world of wealth,
power, and privilege.
While out horseback riding, Tom Buchanan happens upon Gatsby's mansion. There he
meets both Nick and Gatsby, to whom he takes an immediate dislike. To Tom, Gatsby is
part of the "new rich," and thus poses a danger to the old order that Tom holds dear.
Despite this, he accompanies Daisy to Gatsby's next party; there, he is exceedingly rude
and condescending toward Gatsby. Nick realizes that Gatsby wants Daisy to renounce her
husband and her marriage; in this way, they can recover the years they have lost since
they first parted. Gatsby's great flaw is that his great love of Daisy is a kind of worship,
and that he fails to see her flaws. He believes that he can undo the past, and forgets that
Daisy's essentially small-minded and cowardly nature was what initially caused their
separation.
After his reunion with Daisy, Gatsby ceases to throw his elaborate parties. The only
reason he threw such parties was the chance that Daisy (or someone who knew her)
might attend. Daisy invites Gatsby, Nick and Jordan to lunch at her house. In an attempt
to make Tom jealous, and to exact revenge for his affair, Daisy is highly indiscreet about
her relationship with Gatsby. She even tells Gatsby that she loves him while Tom is in
earshot.
Although Tom is himself having an affair, he is furious at the thought that his wife could
be unfaithful to him. He forces the group to drive into the city: there, in a suite at the
Plaza Hotel, Tom and Gatsby have a bitter confrontation. Tom denounces Gatsby for his
low birth, and reveals to Daisy that Gatsby's fortune has been made through illegal
activities. Daisy's real allegiance is to Tom: when Gatsby begs her to say that she does not
love her husband, she refuses him. Tom permits Gatsby to drive Daisy back to East Egg;
in this way, he displays his contempt for Gatsby, as well as his faith in his wife's complete
subjection.
On the trip back to East Egg, Gatsby allows Daisy to drive in order to calm her ragged
nerves. Passing Wilson's garage, Daisy swerves to avoid another car and ends up hitting
Myrtle; she is killed instantly. Nick advises Gatsby to leave town until the situation
calms. Gatsby, however, refuses to leave: he remains in order to ensure that Daisy is safe.
George Wilson, driven nearly mad by the death of his wife, is desperate to find her killer.
Tom Buchanan tells him that Gatsby was the driver of the fatal car. Wilson, who has
decided that the driver of the car must also have been Myrtle's lover, shoots Gatsby
before committing suicide himself.
After the murder, the Buchanans leave town to distance themselves from the violence for
which they are responsible. Nick is left to organize Gatsby's funeral, but finds that few
people cared for Gatsby. Only Meyer Wolfsheim shows a modicum of grief, and few
people attend the funeral. Nick seeks out Gatsby's father, Henry Gatz, and brings him to

22
New York for the funeral. From Henry, Nick learns the full scope of Gatsby's visions of
greatness and his dreams of self-improvement.
Thoroughly disgusted with life in New York, Nick decides to return to the Midwest.
Before his departure, Nick sees Tom Buchanan once more. Tom tries to elicit Nick's
sympathy; he believes that all of his actions were thoroughly justified, and he wants Nick
to agree.
Nick muses that Gatsby, alone among the people of his acquaintance, strove to transform
his dreams into reality; it is this that makes him "great." Nick also believes, however, that
the time for such grand aspirations is over: greed and dishonesty have irrevocably
corrupted both the American Dream and the dreams of individual Americans.

Tender is the Night Summary

Rosemary Hoyt, a beautiful 18-year-old American actress, arrives with her mother at
Gausse's hotel on the French Riviera for a vacation. She meets Dick Diver, a charming
and handsome psychiatrist, and his beautiful wife, Nicole Diver. Rosemary instantly falls
in love with Dick and enters the world of the Divers, which is full of people and parties
and gaiety. She meets other people on the Riviera (both at the beach and through the
Divers), such as the McKiscos, Abe North, and Tommy Barban. Rosemary boldly
confesses her feelings for Dick, and he begins to reciprocate them. Rosemary
accompanies the Divers to Paris where, after Abe North is involved in the murder of a
black man, Rosemary sees Nicole having a nervous breakdown in the hotel bathroom.
The narrative flashes back to Dick's days as a young student. He attended Yale, went to
Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, and got his medical degree from Johns Hopkins. He was
considered to have great promise, and he sought both to practice as a psychiatrist and to
publish medical treatises. At a psychiatric clinic on the Zurichsee, Dick meets the 16year-old Nicole Warren, a Chicago heiress who is there because she suffers from
schizophrenia (caused by her father's molestation of her). Nicole writes Dick letters while
he is enlisted as a soldier, and the letters reveal both her love for him and improvement in
her disorder. When Dick returns, they fall in love, marry, travel together, buy a house on
the French Riviera, and have two children.
With Nicole's money, Dick invests in a clinic in Switzerland with a friend. At this point,
Dick's life begins to deteriorate. He is accused of seducing the 15-year-old daughter of
one of his patients. Nicole, motivated by insane jealousy, runs their car off a road. In
order to get away from the turmoil, Dick leaves for Berlin but, learning that his father has
passed away, heads to America. Dick stops in Rome on his way back, where he sees
Rosemary, and they finally consummate their love. He becomes very jealous of a male
actor, causing a scene with her and, subsequently, going out and drinking too much. He
becomes belligerent with an Italian taxi driver and is thrown in jail. Baby Warren
(Nicole's sister) rescues him. When Dick returns to the clinic, he learns that his excessive
drinking has compromised his career. His business partner asks him to leave the business.

23
When the Divers return to America, Dick continues to weaken and unravel. He drinks
heavily, makes a fool of himself, and insults his old friends. Nicole, who has become
increasingly strong and frustrated with Dick's behavior, has an affair with Tommy
Barban. She and Dick divorce so that she can remarry Tommy, and Dick moves back to
America to live a somewhat unsuccessful and anonymous existence in small-town New
York.

This Side of Paradise

This Side of Paradise chronicles the life of Amory Blaine from his childhood up through
his early twenties. Born the son of a wealthy and sophisticated woman, Beatrice, Amory
travels the country with his mother until he attends the fictitious St. Regis prep school in
New England. He is handsome, quite intelligent though lazy in his schoolwork, and he
earns admission to Princeton. Though initially concerned with being a success on
campus, after failing a class he gives himself over to idleness; he prefers to learn through
reading and discussions with friends than through his classes.
Toward the end of his college career, America enters World War I and Amory dutifully
enlists, forgoing his degree. During his time overseas, Beatrice passes away. Upon his
return to America, Amory meets the young debutante Rosalind Connage, the sister of his
college friend Alec. The two fall deeply in love, but because of his family's poor
investments, Amory has little money, and Rosalind does not wish to marry into poverty.
Despite Amory's best efforts to earn money at an advertising agency, Rosalind breaks off
their engagement in order to marry a wealthier man, devastating Amory. He goes on a
three week drinking binge, which is finally terminated by the advent of the Prohibition.
Amory's quest for self-knowledge begins to be realized. He has a short summer romance
with the wild Eleanor. Soon after, Alec is caught with a girl in his hotel room, and Amory
takes the blame. Amory then discovers that his last close tie, the dear friend of his mother
and his father figure, Monsignor Darcy, has passed away. Further, the family finances
have left him almost no money. He decides to walk to Princeton and is picked up along
the way by the wealthy father of a friend who died in the war. Amory expounds his new
socialist principles and then continues to walk to Princeton. He arrives late at night,
pining for Rosalind. Amory reaches his hands to the sky and says "I know myself, but
that is all--"

24
Ernest Miller Hemingway
Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 July 2, 1961) was an American author and
journalist. His economical and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century
fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations.
Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the mid-1950s, and
won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. He published seven novels, six short story
collections, and two non-fiction works. Additional works, including three novels, four
short story collections, and three non-fiction works, were published posthumously. Many
of his works are considered classics of American literature.
Hemingway was raised in Oak Park, Illinois. After high school he reported for a few
months for The Kansas City Star, before leaving for the Italian front to enlist with the
World War I ambulance drivers. In 1918, he was seriously wounded and returned home.
His wartime experiences formed the basis for his novel A Farewell to Arms (1929).
In 1921, he married Hadley Richardson, the first of his four wives. The couple moved to
Paris, where he worked as a foreign correspondent and fell under the influence of the
modernist writers and artists of the 1920s "Lost Generation" expatriate community. He
published his first novel, The Sun Also Rises in 1926. After his 1927 divorce from Hadley
Richardson, Hemingway married Pauline Pfeiffer; they divorced after he returned from
the Spanish Civil War where he had been a journalist, and after which he wrote For
Whom the Bell Tolls (1940). Martha Gellhorn became his third wife in 1940; they
separated when he met Mary Welsh in London during World War II. He was present at
the Normandy landings and the liberation of Paris.
Shortly after the publication of The Old Man and the Sea (1952), Hemingway went on
safari to Africa, where he was almost killed in two successive plane crashes that left him
in pain or ill health for much of his remaining lifetime. Hemingway maintained
permanent residences in Key West, Florida (1930s) and Cuba (1940s and 1950s), and in
1959, he bought a house in Ketchum, Idaho, where he committed suicide in the summer
of 1961.

25

The Sun Also Rises Summary

The narrator, Jake Barnes, describes Robert Cohn, a rich Jew who graduated from
Princeton with low self-esteem, had an unsuccessful marriage, lost most of his
inheritance, and moved to Paris with an exploitative woman, Frances, to write a novel.
Jake plays tennis with him. Cohn sold his novel in America and returned with arrogance
and a craving for adventure. He frequently imposes on Jake.
One night, Jake picks up a girl, Georgette, and turns down her sexual advances,
explaining he is "sick." They end up at a dancing-club, where Jake sees the beautiful and
independent Lady Ashley, known to him as Brett. He eventually leaves with her; they
have had a romantic relationship in the past, and though they kiss, Brett does not want to
go through "'that hell again.'" They briefly discuss Jake's physical condition, which
appears to be impotence. They meet one of Brett's friends, Count Mippipopolous. Jake
makes plans to see her tomorrow. In his bed, he cries when thinking about Brett, and is
woken when Brett drunkenly comes up. She invites him to go out with her and the count
for dinner tomorrow, kisses him, and leaves.
The next day, Cohn asks Jake about Brett; he explains she's getting a divorce now and is
going to marry Mike Campbell, who is currently in Scotland. Cohn admits he's falling in
love with her. Jake says he met her while he was in a hospital during the war; she was a
volunteer nurse and had married the man whose name she took, Ashley. Later, after Brett
blows off a date with Jake, Frances humiliates Cohn in front of Jake. Jake leaves, unable
to stand it.
Brett shows up with the count. Brett joins Jake in his room, and Jake says he loves her.
Brett sends the count out for champagne. Jake asks Brett if they could live together, but
she says they couldn't, as she would "tromper" (be unfaithful to, or elude) him. She says
she is going away from him tomorrow, to San Sebastian, until Mike comes back. The
count returns and shows his scars on his stomach and back from arrow wounds in various
wars. They go to a club. Brett tells Jake about Mike, then tells Jake she is "'so
miserable.'" They take the count's car to her hotel, but Brett doesn't want Jake to come up
with her. They kiss at her door, but Brett pushes him away before leaving.
Jake does not see Brett until she returns from San Sebastian, nor does he see Cohn, who
takes a trip to the country. He works hard in preparation for his trip at the end of June to
Spain with Bill Gorton. Bill arrives in Paris, and they run into Brett, just back from her
trip. That night, they meet up with Brett and Mike. Brett introduces Mike as an
"'undischarged bankrupt'"; he explains that his ex-partner "'did me in.'" Mike is very
drunk and possessive of Brett.
Jake receives a letter from the vacationing Cohn, who is eager to go on the fishing trip
with Jake and Bill. Jake writes him and gives him instructions for where to meet them in
Spain. Mike also asks if Jake would mind if they accompanied him to Spain, and Jake
says it's fine. When Mike leaves, Brett tells Jake that it might be "'rough'" on Cohn to

26
accompany them, as she went to San Sebastian with him. Bill and Jake take a train to
Bayonne and meet Cohn that night.
Jake, Bill, and Cohn hire a car and drive to Pamplona. They discuss Brett and Mike;
Cohn bets Bill that they won't arrive. At night, Jake and Cohn go to meet Brett and Mike's
train; they are not on it. Cohn tells Bill not to worry about the bet. Jake receives a
telegram from Brett and Mike; they've stopped over in San Sebastian. They make plans to
leave tomorrow; if Brett and Mike get in later, they can follow them. The next day, Cohn
says he won't be leaving with them. He explains that he is supposed to meet Brett and
Mike in San Sebastian, as he had suggested it to Brett. Bill and Jake share information
about Cohn and Brett, and decide they're better off without him and take a bus to
Burguete for fishing.
Bill and Jake bond while fishing, and meet an Englishman named Harris at their inn. One
day, Jake receives a letter from Mike; Brett passed out on the train, so they decided to
recuperate in San Sebastian with old friends. He says they are going to Pamplona. Jake
and Bill take a bus to Pamplona. They talk to the head of the hotel, Montoya, and learn
about the bull-fights for the next couple of days. Montoya believes he and Jake are true,
passionate "aficionados" of bull-fighting. The good bull-fighters stay at Montoya's hotel.
Jake describes the "unloadings" of the bull-fights to Bill: they release the bulls from their
corrals, and they chase and gore steers, young oxen castrated before sexual maturity. The
purpose is to calm down the bulls and prevent them from fighting each other. Jake and
Bill find Brett, Mike, and Cohn, and they watch the bulls unloaded. One steer is gored
and excluded, while the other befriends the bulls. Brett is fascinated. Later, Mike says
Cohn follows Brett around like a steer and that he is not wanted. Bill leads Cohn away.
While Mike knows Brett has affairs -- she tells him -- he finds Cohn pathetic. Later,
everyone has a pleasant dinner together, pretending nothing happened. Jake has a rough
night, tormenting himself with thoughts of Brett. Pamplona gets ready the next two days
for the fiesta.
The fiesta explodes at noontime on Sunday. While some people are at mass, as San
Fermin is also a religious festival, music, dancing, and drinking fill the streets.
Wearing wreaths of garlic, dancers chant around Brett in a circle. They do the same to
Bill and Jake. Afterwards, they seat Brett on a cask from which they draw wine, and give
her a wreath of garlic. Jake, Bill, and Mike share food and drink with the Spaniards. Jake
wakes the next morning to the rocket announcing the release of the bulls. He watches
from the balcony. Men run down the street to the bull-ring, chased by bulls.
Jake and his friends go to the bull-fight that afternoon. Jake gives some advice to Brett
about watching the fight; she is nervous about what will happen when the bull attacks the
horse. Jake returns to the hotel for his wine-skin, where Montoya briefly introduces him
to Pedro Romero, an extremely good-looking young bull-fighter. Jack finds the fight
good, as Romero is a "real" bull-fighter. Later, Mike points out and Brett admits that she
could not stop staring at Romero. Romero dominates the second day of fighting. Jake

27
explains to Brett why Romero is so skilled a matador. Mike jokes that Brett is falling in
love with Romero.
At dinner in the hotel, Romero invites Jake to his table. They discuss bull-fighting. Jake
introduces him to his friends, and Brett flirts with Romero; Mike, drunk and disorderly,
makes disparaging comments to Romero and, when he leaves, to Cohn. Later, Brett tells
Cohn to leave her and Jake alone. She admits she has fallen in love with Romero and
cannot help it. She feels she has to do something, as she has lost her self-respect with the
way Mike and Cohn are around her. She asks Jake to help her through this, and they find
Romero in the caf with other bull-fighters. Romero joins them. Jake leaves with an
excuse, but he makes it clear it is to leave Romero and Brett alone. When he returns later,
they are gone.
Jake reunites with Mike, Bill, and Cohn. Mike says that Brett has gone off with Romero.
Cohn asks Jake if it's true, and when he receives no answer, calls Jake a "'pimp.'" They
fight, and Cohn beats up Jake and Mike. Later, at the hotel, Bill tells Jake that Cohn
wants to see him. Jake reluctantly goes to Cohn's room. Cohn is crying and begs Jake's
forgiveness, and says he'll be leaving in the morning. He says he can't take the way Brett
treats him like a stranger, after they had lived together in San Sebastian. Jake says
goodbye to him.
Jakes wakes and goes to the bull-ring to watch the bulls run in. A bull gores one man in
the back. Jake reads about the man in the paper the next day, and the town has a funeral
for him the day after that. Jake describes how Romero killed the bull the afternoon of the
funeral. Its ear was cut off and given to Romero, who gave it to Brett. She discarded the
ear in her hotel room's drawer. Bill and Mike tell Jake that after Cohn beat up him and
Mike, he found Brett in Romero's room and beat up Romero badly. When he tried to
apologize to Romero, the bull-fighter hit Cohn in the face, and then threatened to kill him
if he weren't out of town by the morning. Brett told Cohn off until he cried. Brett is now
taking care of Romero. Mike also relates Brett's unhappy relationship with the
Englishman Lord Ashley (from whom she received her title).
It is the last day of the fiesta. Brett tells Jake and Bill at the caf that Romero is badly
hurt and won't leave his room, though he is still going to fight. Mike angrily tips over the
table. Brett leaves with Jake. She tells him she is happy, and asks him to go to the fight
with her. After lunch, Jake, Bill, and Brett sit ring-side at the fight. Three matadors are
there -- Romero, Marcial, and Belmonte. Belmonte, a legend who recently came out
retirement, renowned for working close to the bull and gravely endangering himself, goes
first and is very good, but not as good as he used to be, and the crowd turns against him.
Romero is elegant in the "quite," in which the bull charges all three matadors. With his
own bull, whose vision is impaired, Romero works to make the match exciting, but the
crowd does not understand the situation, and believes he is afraid. He brilliantly handles
the last bull, the one that gored the man the other day. His brother cuts the ear off the bull
and hands it to Romero, who gives it to Brett. That night, Mike tells Jake that Brett left
with Romero on the train.

28
The fiesta is over the next morning. The men split up, and Jake ends up in San Sebastian.
He spends several relaxing days there until he receives a telegram from Brett in Madrid,
saying she is in trouble and asking him to come to her hotel. He arrives in Madrid on the
overnight train. Brett is happy to see him and kisses him, and says she made Romero
leave yesterday. He wanted to marry her so that she "'couldn't go away from him.'"
Ultimately, she feels she could have lived with him had she not seen it would be bad for
him. Brett cries, and Jake holds her. She says she is returning to Mike. They get train
tickets for that night, and later go for a taxi ride through Madrid. Brett laments that she
and Jake could have had "'such a damned good time together.'" Jake replies, "'YesIsn't it
pretty to think so?'"

A Farewell to Arms Summary

Lieutenant Frederic Henry, a young American ambulance driver with the Italian army
during World War I, takes a winter leave from the front. When he returns, he meets and
quickly falls in love with Catherine Barkley, an English nurse's aide in the town's British
hospital. She mourns the death of her fianc from the war last year, and she eagerly enters
the pleasurable diversion the game of love offers with Henry. Henry, too, is revived by
love after the horror he has seen of war.
Henry's knee is badly wounded during an artillery bombardment, and he is sent to a
hospital in Milan for an operation. Catherine transfers to his hospital and helps him
recuperate from the surgery. They spend all their free time together, and their love
deepens as they gradually acknowledge that they stand alone against the cruel world.
Before Henry returns to the front, Catherine reveals she is pregnant. They are both
pleased with this, however, and cannot wait to see each other again.
Back at the front, the Germans and Austrians break through the Italian line, and the
Italians are forced to make a lengthy retreat. Henry travels with some other drivers, two
Italian engineering sergeants, and two Italian girls. When the sergeants abandon the
drivers when their car gets stuck, Henry shoots one of them, and another driver finishes
him off. Later, the trigger-happy Italian rear guard mistakenly shoots one of the Italian
drivers. One of the drivers deserts the group, choosing to be taken prisoner rather than
face potential death. At a bridge over a flooded river, the corrupt Italian military singles
out Henry as a lieutenant and accuses him of treachery leading to the Italian defeat.
Knowing he will be executed, Henry jumps into the river and escapes with the current.
Henry manages to get out of the fast-moving river and jump a train to Milan. He thinks
he has made a "separate peace" and is no longer attached to the military. He finds
Catherine in the town of Stresa and, prior to Henry's arrest for desertion, the two make a
daring nighttime escape by a borrowed boat to Switzerland. They enjoy an idyllic,
isolated life that winter in the Swiss town of Montreux, spending time outdoors and
preparing for the arrival of their baby; Henry is not completely without guilt, however,
for abandoning his friends at the front.

29
They move to the town of Lausanne in the spring to be close to its hospital, and Catherine
soon goes into labor. The pregnancy is lengthy and painful, and the baby, delivered
through a Caesarean, is stillborn. Catherine dies soon after of multiple hemorrhages with
Henry by her side. He tries to say goodbye to her, but it is like saying goodbye to a statue,
and he walks back to his hotel room in the rain.

For Whom the Bell Tolls Summary

This novel traces three days in the life of Robert Jordan, an American Spanish professor
who has volunteered to fight for the Loyalists in the Spanish Civil War. Jordan is a
dynamite expert, and is ordered by General Golz, a Russian leader of the International
Brigades, to bomb a bridge as part of their offensive against the Fascists. Golz is only
interested in the offensive as a means of practicing his military tactics and he is cynical
about its success in the hands of the Spanish peasants.
Anselmo, an old guide, brings Jordan through the woods to the hideout, an abandoned
cave, of the men who will help him complete his mission. The guerillas that Jordan
encounters obviously do not want to be involved in the war any longer. They meet
Agustin in the woods, visibly relieved to see them because he has forgotten the password
to their lair. The gypsy Rafael, despite being the guard, is only interested in cracking
jokes. He tells Jordan about Kashkin, the previous foreign dynamite expert who,
ironically, killed himself after being wounded during their last mission, the explosion of a
train. The most cynical and despondent guerilla, however, is Pablo, their leader. Despite
being a courageous man before, Pablo now wants only to return to his village to raise the
horses he gained as spoils of war. Many conflicts arise between Pablo and Jordan, as the
Pablo resents that a foreigner is interfering in a matter that can risk his own life and those
of his band.
There are also two women at the camp: Pilar, who is Pablo's wife, and Maria, a girl they
rescued from the train carrying prisoners of war. Despite her cropped hair, which was
shaved during her interment by the Fascists and the obvious psychological damage
wrought upon her, she is beautiful. Pilar is an ugly woman, but celebrated for her bravery.
Since Pablo "went bad" and lost the courage and zeal he displayed at the beginning of the
war, Pilar maintains the unity of his band. Pilar is a gypsy and, upon introductions, reads
Jordan's palm. The future she foretells there, but will not reveal, is grim.
Pablo's cowardice soon makes him relinquish power to Pilar, his bold wife. Pablo
announces that he is against blowing up the bridge, but Pilar backs Robert Jordan and the
men follow her lead. After the confrontation, Rafael tells Jordan that he should have
killed Pablo, and that he would have had the support of the guerillas. Jordan reasons that,
unprovoked, this would be assassination. As Pablo continues to insult and cause trouble
of Jordan throughout the novel, Jordan wonders if he made the right decision.
After the confrontation with Pablo, during the night after the first day, Jordan makes love
to Maria when she comes to his makeshift bed outside the cave. The nineteen-year-old
girl, who has been raped and orphaned, has fallen quickly and madly in love with Jordan.

30
She believes that her love will purify her from past atrocities committed to her. Jordan
returns her feelings, as he has gazed upon her all day with a lump in his throat. He
celebrates finding, for the first time, happiness in unity with another individual.
Jordan's newfound love, however, is overshadowed by the many obstacles he must face to
complete his mission. The appearance of enemy planes, for one, heighten tension at the
camp because either they are planning an attack of their own, or have gotten wind of the
Loyalist offensive. So too, when Maria, Pilar and Jordan journey up the mountain to the
guerilla leader El Sordo's camp, he reminds them of how dangerous the bridge mission is.
He agrees to help them, but as they leave camp it begins to snow. Now, the enemy could
be able to follow El Sordo's tracks to the bridge.
The only person who really encourages Jordan is Anselmo, who he finds loyally waiting
in his post, despite the storm, for Jordan to dismiss him. Besides being a loyal soldier
who is committed to the Cause, Anselmo is distinguished as a true humanitarian. He is
preoccupied not with the thought of losing his own life during the attack on the bridge,
but rather fears that Jordan will order him to kill another human being. He sees the enemy
not as evil Fascists, as do the others, but as poor countrymen like themselves.
Pablo again makes trouble for Jordan on the second day, when he baits him about his
relationship with Maria. Jordan tries to goad him into fighting, as this would be an
appropriate time to kill him for the sake of the mission. Pablo refuses to be baited,
however, and later resumes a cooperative mood. Jordan trusts him less than ever, and
grows increasingly worrisome about the success of the mission. Thus, Jordan feels his
time is limited, which is evidenced by his urgent need to make love to Maria.
The next morning, Jordan is awakened by the sounds of an approaching enemy
horseman. Jordan shoots the soldier, and the camp frantically scrambles to arm
themselves with a machine gun that did not even come with directions. Tension mounts
as Fascist troops pass by the camp. Jordan acts as the example of level-headedness for his
men, as Agustin wants to kill the passing soldiers. Then, sounds come from El Sordo's.
His camp is attacked and bombed, and they all are killed. Primitivo urges Jordan to help
El Sordo, but Jordan knows that the bridge mission must be his priority, even over the
lives of his comrades. Thus, the guerillas remain undiscovered for the time being. The
fighting between El Sordo and the Fascists, led by Lieutenant Berrendo, show how
neither side really wants to fight or die. Jordan sends a young guerilla, to General Golz
with news of El Sordo's defeat and a request that the offensive be cancelled.
The last night before the attack is very eventful. Maria is inflicted by pain, so the couple
discusses their future and their luck in finding each other. Jordan, however, thinks that
being unable to make love is a bad omen. Indeed, his presentiment comes true when Pilar
wakes him with the news that Pablo, ever treacherous, has fled with some dynamite.
Jordan is worried now that his plan won't work. Jordan does not have enough men and
Pablo stole the equipment he needed to blow the bridge correctly. It is highly unlikely
that the attack will be postponed, even if Andres does deliver the message to General

31
Golz. Pablo returns that morning accompanied by five extra men and their horses,
claiming that he is not a coward after all and will help blow the bridge.
The apathy and inefficiency of the Loyalist army stalls Andres, and the message does not
reach General Golz in time. The bridge bombing must proceed. At the bridge, Jordan
orders Anselmo to kill the sentry, which he tearfully accomplishes. Then they dynamite
the bridge, and Anselmo is killed by a falling rock. In the ensuing fighting, the only
guerillas who survive are Pablo, Pilar, Maria, Primitivo and Agustin . Jordan is hit by a
shell as they escape on horseback and is unable to escape. He tells Maria that they will
always be one person, and refuses to be shot out of mercy. His comrades give him a
machine gun so that he can defend himself from the approaching enemy. Jordan fights
pain and suicidal thoughts with the hope that he can buy time for the fleeing guerillas.
The novel closes here, as Jordan awaits his certain death on the pine-covered ground he
appeared on in the first scene.

The Old Man and the Sea Summary

There is an old fisherman in Cuba, Santiago, who has gone eighty-four days without a
catch. He is "thin and gaunt with deep wrinkles in the back of his neck,...and his hands
had deep-creased scars from handling heavy fish on the cords. But none of these scars
were fresh. They were as old as erosions in a fishless desert" (10). Santiago's lack of
success, though, does not destroy his spirit, as his "cheerful and undefeated" eyes show
(10). He has a single friend, a boy named Manolin, who helped him during the first forty
days of his dryspell. After forty days, though, Manolin's parents decided the old man was
unlucky and ordered their son to join another boat. Despite this, the boy helps the old
man to bring in his empty boat every day.
Santiago tells Manolin that tomorrow he will go out far in the Gulf to fish. The two
gather Santiago's things from his boat and go to the old man's house. His house is very
simple with a bed, table, and chair on a dirt floor. The two friends speak for a while, then
Manolin leaves briefly to get food. Santiago falls asleep.
When Manolin returns, he wakes Santiago. The two eat the food the boy has brought.
During the course of the meal, the boy realizes the squalor in which the old man lives and
reminds himself to bring the old man a shirt, shoes, a jacket, and a blanket for the coming
winter. Manolin and Santiago talk baseball for a while, and the boy then leaves to be
woken in the morning by the old man. Santiago sleeps.
Santiago dreams of Africa, where he traveled as a shipmate in his youth. "He lived along
that coast now every night and in his dreams he heard the surf roar and saw the native
boats come riding through it....He dreamed of places now and lions on the beach" (24).
The old man wakes and retrieves the boy from his house. The two take the old man's
supplies from his shack to his boat and enjoy coffee at an early morning place that serves
fisherman. The boy leaves to fetch the sardines for the old man. When he returns, he
wishes the old man luck, and Santiago goes out to sea.

32
Santiago leaves shore early in the morning, before sunrise. "He knew he was going far
out and he left the smell of the land behind and rowed out into the clean early morning
smell of the ocean" (28). Soon, Santiago rows over the "great well," a sudden drop of
seven hundred fathoms where shrimp, bait fish, and squid congregate. Moving along,
Santiago spots flying fish and birds, expressing great sympathy for the latter. As he
queries, "Why did they make birds so delicate and fine as those sea swallows when the
ocean can be so cruel? She is kind and very beautiful. But she can be so cruel...." (29).
Santiago keeps pressing out, past the great well where he has been recently unsuccessful.
Santiago sees a man-of-war bird overhead and notices that the bird has spied something
in the water. The old man follows near the bird, and drops his own lines into the area,
hoping to capture the fish the bird has seen. There is a large school of dolphin traveling
fast, too fast for either the bird or Santiago to capture. Santiago moves on, hoping to
catch a stray or perhaps even discover a marlin tracking the school. He catches a small
tuna after not too long and then feels a bite on one of his deeper lines.
The first bite is hard, and the stick to which the line is connected drops sharply. The next
tug is more tentative, but Santiago knows exactly what it is. "One hundred fathoms down
a marlin was eating the sardines that covered the point and the shank of the hook where
the hand-forged hook projected from the head of the small tuna" (41). Encouraged by a
bite at so deep a depth so far out in the Gulf, Santiago reasons that the fish much be very
large.
The marlin nibbles around the hook for some time, refusing to take the bait fully.
Santiago speaks aloud, as if to cajole the fish into accepting the bait. He says, "Come
on....Make another turn. Just smell them. Aren't they lovely? Eat them good now and then
there is the tuna. Hard and cold and lovely. Don't be shy fish. Eat them" (42). After many
false bites, the marlin finally takes the tuna and pulls out a great length of line.
Santiago waits a bit for the marlin to swallow the hook and then pulls hard on the line to
bring the marlin up to the surface. The fish is strong, though, and does not come up.
Instead, he swims away, dragging the old man and his skiff along behind. Santiago
wishes he had Manolin with him to help.
As the sun goes down, the marlin continues on in the same direction, and Santiago loses
sight of land altogether. Expressing his resolve, Santiago says, "Fish,...I'll stay with you
until I am dead" (52). He expresses ambivalence over whether he wants the fish to jump,
wanting to end the struggle as quickly as possible but worrying that the hook might slip
out of the fish's mouth. Echoing his former resolve though with less certainty, Santiago
says, "Fish,...I love you and respect you very much. But I will kill you dead before this
day ends" (54).
A small bird land on the boat, and while Santiago is speaking to the bird, the marlin
lurches forward and pulls the old man down, cutting his hand. Lowering his hand to
water to clean it, Santiago notices that the marlin has slowed down. He decides to eat a
tuna he has caught in order to give him strength for his ordeal. As he is cutting the fish,

33
though, his left hand cramps. "What kind of hand is that," Santiago says, "Cramp then if
you want. Make yourself into a claw. It will do you no good" (58). The old man eats the
tuna, hoping it will renew his strength and help release his hand.
Just then, the marlin comes out of the water quickly and descends into the water again.
Santiago is amazed by its size, two feet longer than the skiff. He realizes that the marlin
could destroy the boat if he wanted to and says, "...[T]hank God, they are not as
intelligent as we who kill them; although they are more noble and more able" (63).
Santiago says prayers to assuage his worried heart, and settles into the chase once again.
As the sun sets, Santiago thinks back to triumphs of his past in order to give himself more
confidence in the present. He remembers a great arm-wrestling match he had at a tavern
in Casablanca. It had lasted a full day and a night, but Santiago, El Campeon (The
Champion) as he was known then, eventually won. "He decided that he could beat
anyone if he wanted to badly enough and he decided that it was bad for his right hand for
fishing" (70). He tried to wrestle with his left hand but it was a traitor then as it had been
now.
Recalling his exhaustion, Santiago decides that he must sleep some if he is to kill the
marlin. He cuts up the dolphin he has caught to prevent spoiling, and eats some of it
before contriving a way to sleep. Santiago wraps the line around himself and leans
against the bow to anchor himself, leaving his left hand on the rope to wake him if the
marlin lurches. Soon, the old man is asleep, dreaming of a school of porpoises, his village
house, and finally of the lions of his youth on the African beach.
Santiago is awoken by the line rushing furiously through his right hand. The marlin leaps
out of the water and it is all the old man can do to hold onto the line, now cutting his hand
badly and dragging him down to the bottom of the skiff. Santiago finds his balance,
though, and realizes that the marlin has filled the air sacks on his back and cannot go
deep to die. The marlin will circle and then the endgame will begin.
At sunrise, the marlin begins a large circle. Santiago holds the line strongly, pulling it in
slowly as the marlin goes round. At the third turn, Santiago sees the fish and is amazed by
its size. He readies the harpoon and pulls the line in more. The marlin tries desperately to
pull away. Santiago, no longer able to speak for lack of water, thinks, "You are killing me,
fish....But you have a right to. Never have I seen a greater, or more beautiful, or a calmer
or more noble thing than you, brother. Come on and kill me. I do not care who kills you"
(92). This marlin continues to circle, coming closer and pulling out. At last it is next to
the skiff, and Santiago drove his harpoon into the marlin's chest.
"Then the fish came alive, with his death in him, and rose high out of the water showing
all his great length and width and all his power and his beauty" (94). It crashed into the
sea, blinding Santiago with a shower of sea spray. With the glimpse of vision he had,
Santiago saw the slain beast laying on its back, crimson blood disseminating into the
azure water. Seeing his prize, Santiago says, "I am a tired old man. But I have killed this
fish which is my brother and now I must do the slave work" (95).

34
Having killed the Marlin, Santiago lashes its body alongside his skiff. He pulls a line
through the marlin's gills and out its mouth, keeping its head near the bow. "I want to see
him, he thought, and to touch and to feel him. He is my fortune, he thought" (95). Having
secured the marlin to the skiff, Santiago draws the sail and lets the trade wind push him
toward the southwest.
An hour after Santiago killed the marlin, a mako shark appears. It had followed the trail
of blood the slain marlin left in its wake. As the shark approaches the boat, Santiago
prepares his harpoon, hoping to kill the shark before it tears apart the marlin. "The shark's
head was out of water and his back was coming out and the old man could hear the noise
of skin and flesh ripping on the big fish when he rammed the harpoon down onto the
shark's head" (102). The dead shark slowly sinks into the deep ocean water.
Two hours later, two shovel-nosed sharks arrive at the skiff. After losing his harpoon to
the mako, Santiago fastens his knife to the end of the oar and now wields this against the
sharks. He kills the first shark easily, but while he does this, the other shark is ripping at
the marlin underneath the boat. Santiago lets go of the sheet to swing broadside and
reveal the shark underneath. After some struggle, he kills this shark as well.
Santiago apologizes to the fish for the mutilation he has suffered. He admits, "I shouldn't
have gone out so far, fish....Neither for you nor for me. I am sorry, fish" (110). Tired and
losing hope, Santiago sits and waits for the next attacker, a single shovel-nosed shark.
The old man succeeds in killing the fish but breaks his knife blade in the process.
More sharks appear at sunset and Santiago only has a club with which to beat them away.
He does not kill the sharks, but damages them enough to prevent their return. Santiago
then looks forward to nightfall as he will be able to see the lights of Havana, guiding him
back to land. He regrets not having cleaved off the marlin's sword to use as a weapon
when he had the knife and apologizes again to the fish. At around ten o'clock, he sees the
light of Havana and steers toward it.
In the night, the sharks return. "[B]y midnight he fought and this time he knew the fight
was useless. They came in a pack and he could only see the lines in the water their fins
made and their phosphorescence as they threw themselves on the fish" (118). He clubs
desperately at the fish, but the club was soon taken away by a shark. Santiago grabs the
tiller and attacks the sharks until the tiller breaks. "That was the last shark of the pack that
came. There was nothing more for them to eat" (119).
Santiago "sailed lightly now and he had no thoughts nor any feelings of any kind" (119).
He concentrates purely on steering homewards and ignores the sharks that came to gnaw
on the marlin's bones. When he arrives at the harbor, everyone is asleep. Santiago steps
out of the boat, carrying the mast back to his shack. "He started to climb again and at the
top he fell and lay for some time with the mast across his shoulder. He tried to get up. But
it was too difficult and he sat there with the mast on his shoulder and looked at the road"
(121). When he finally arose, he had to sit five times before reaching home. Arriving at
his shack, Santiago collapsed on his bed and fell asleep.

35
Manolin arrives at the shack while Santiago is still asleep. The boy leaves quickly to get
some coffee for Santiago, crying on his way to the Terrace. Manolin sees fisherman
gathered around the skiff, measuring the marlin at eighteen feet long. When Manolin
returns to the shack, Santiago is awake. The two speak for a while, and Manolin says,
"Now we will fish together again," To which Santiago replies, "No. I am not lucky. I am
not lucky anymore" (125). Manolin objects, "The hell with luck....I'll bring the luck with
me" (125). Santiago acquiesces and Manolin leaves to fetch food and a shirt.
That afternoon there are tourists on the Terrace. A female tourist sees the skeleton of the
marlin moving in the tide. Not recognizing the skeleton, she asks the waiter what it is. He
responds in broken English "eshark," thinking she wants to know what happened. She
comments to her partner that she didn't know sharks had such beautiful tails. Meanwhile,
back in Santiago's shack, the old man "was still sleeping on his face and the boy was
sitting by him watching him. The old man was dreaming about lions" (127).

Biography of John Steinbeck (1902-1968)

John Steinbeck
John Steinbeck was born in Salinas, California in 1902, and spent most of his life in
Monterey County, the setting of much of his fiction. He attended Stanford University
intermittently between 1920 and 1926. Steinbeck did not graduate from Stanford, but
instead chose to support himself through manual labor while writing. His experiences
among the working classes in California lent authenticity to his depiction of the lives of
the workers, who remain the central characters of his most important novels.
Steinbeck's first novel, Cup of Gold, was published in 1929, and was followed by The
Pastures of Heaven and, in 1933, To a God Unknown. However, his first three novels
were unsuccessful both critically and commercially. Steinbeck had his first success with
Tortilla Flat (1935), an affectionate and gently humorous story about MexicanAmericans. Nevertheless, his subsequent novel, In Dubious Battle (1936) was notable for
its markedly grim outlook. This novel is a classic account of a strike by agricultural
laborers and the pair of Marxist labor organizers who engineer it, and is the first
Steinbeck novel to encompass the striking social commentary that characterizes his most
notable works. Steinbeck received even greater acclaim for the novella Of Mice and Men
(1937), a tragic story about the strange, complex bond between two migrant laborers. His
crowning achievement, The Grapes of Wrath, won Steinbeck a Pulitzer Prize and a
National Book Award. It was also adapted into a classic film directed by John Ford that
was named one of the American Film Institute's one hundred greatest films. The novel
describes the migration of a dispossessed family from the Oklahoma Dust Bowl to

36
California and critiques their subsequent exploitation by a ruthless system of agricultural
economics.
After the best-selling success of The Grapes of Wrath, Steinbeck went to Mexico to
collect marine life with the freelance biologist Edward F. Ricketts, and the two men
collaborated on Sea of Cortez (1941), a study of the fauna of the Gulf of California.
During World War II, Steinbeck wrote some effective pieces of government propaganda,
among them The Moon Is Down (1942), a novel about Norwegians under the Nazis. He
also served as a war correspondent. With the end of World War II and the move from the
Great Depression to economic prosperity Steinbeck's work softened somewhat. While
still containing the elements of social criticism that marked his earlier work, the three
novels Steinbeck published immediately following the war, Cannery Row (1945), The
Pearl, and The Bus (both 1947) were more sentimental and relaxed. Steinbeck also
contributed to several screenplays. He wrote the original stories for several films,
including Lifeboat (1944), directed by Alfred Hitchcock, and A Medal for Benny, and
wrote the screenplay for Elia Kazan's Viva Zapata!, a biographical film about Emiliano
Zapata, the Mexican peasant who rose to the presidency.
Steinbeck married Carol Henning in 1930 and lived with her in Pacific Grove, California.
He spent much of his time in Monterey with his friend, Ricketts, at his Cannery Row
laboratory, an experience which inspired his popular 1945 novel, Cannery Row. In 1943,
Steinbeck married his second wife, Gwyndolyn Conger, with whom he had two children.
1948 was a particularly bad year for Steinbeck: Ricketts died, and Gwyndolyn left him.
However, he found happiness in his 1950 marriage to Elaine Scott, with whom he lived in
New York City. Two years later, he published the highly controversial East of Eden, the
novel he called "the big one," set in the California Salinas Valley.
Steinbeck's later writings were comparatively slight works, but he did make several
notable attempts to reassert his stature as a major novelist: Burning Bright (1950), East of
Eden (1952), and The Winter of Our Discontent (1961). However, none of these works
equaled the critical reputation of his earlier novels. Steinbeck's reputation is dependent
primarily on the naturalistic, proletarian-themed novels that he wrote during the
Depression. It is in these works that Steinbeck is most effective at building rich, symbolic
structures and conveying the archetypal qualities of his characters. Steinbeck received the
Nobel Prize for literature in 1962, and died in New York City in 1968.

37

Biography of Tennessee Williams (1911-1983)

Tennessee Williams was a master playwright of the twentieth century, and his plays A
Streetcar Named Desire, The Glass Menagerie, and Cat On A Hot Tin Roof are
considered among the finest of the American stage. At their best, his twenty-five fulllength plays combined lyrical intensity, haunting loneliness, and hypnotic violence. He is
widely considered the greatest Southern playwright and one of the greatest playwrights in
the history of American drama.
Born Thomas Lanier Williams on March 26, 1911, he suffered through a difficult and
troubling childhood. His father, Cornelius Williams, was a shoe salesman and an
emotionally absent parent. He became increasingly abusive as the Williams children grew
older. His mother, Edwina, was the daughter of a Southern Episcopal minister and had
lived the adolescence and young womanhood of a spoiled Southern belle. Williams was
sickly as a child, and his mother was a loving but smothering woman. In 1918 the family
moved from Mississippi to St. Louis, and the change from a small provincial town to a
big city was very difficult for Williams' mother. The young Williams was also influenced
by his older sister Rose's emotional and mental imbalance during their childhood.
In 1929, Williams enrolled in the University of Missouri. After two years his father
withdrew him for flunking ROTC, and he took a job at his father's shoe company. He
despised the job but worked at the warehouse by day and wrote late into the night. The
strain was too much, and in 1935 Williams had a nervous breakdown. He recovered at his
grandparents' home in Memphis, and during these years he continued to write. Amateur
productions of his early plays were produced in Memphis and St. Louis.
Rose's mental health continued to deteriorate as well. During a fight between Cornelius
and Edwina in 1936, Cornelius made a move towards Rose that he claimed was meant to
calm her. Rose thought his overtures were sexual and suffered a terrible breakdown. Her
parents had her lobotomized shortly afterward.
Williams went back to school and graduated from the University of Iowa in 1938. He
then moved to New Orleans, where he began going by the name Tennessee, a nickname
he'd been given in college thanks to his southern drawl. After struggling with his
sexuality through his youth, he finally entered a new life as a gay man, with a new name,
a new home, and a promising new career.
In the early 40s, Williams moved between several cities for different jobs and playwriting
classes, also working at MGM as a scriptwriter. In 1944 came the great turning point in
his career: The Glass Menagerie. First produced in Chicago to great success, the play
transferred to Broadway in 1945 and won the NY Critics Circle Award.
While success freed Williams financially, it also made it difficult for him to write. He
went to Mexico to work on a play originally titled The Poker Night. This play eventually
became one of his masterpieces, A Streetcar Named Desire. It won Williams a second NY
Critics' Circle Award and a Pulitzer Prize in 1947, enabling him to travel and buy a home

38
in Key West as an escape for both relaxation and writing. The year 1951 brought The
Rose Tattoo and Williams' first Tony award, as well as the successful film adaptation of A
Streetcar Named Desire, starring Vivian Leigh.
Around this time, Williams met Frank Merlo. The two fell in love, and the young man
became Williams' romantic partner until Merlo's untimely death in 1961. He was a
steadying influence on Williams, who suffered from depression and lived in fear that he,
like his sister Rose, would go insane.
The following years were some of Williams' most productive. His plays were a great
success in the United States and abroad, and he was able to write works that were wellreceived by critics and popular with audiences, including The Rose Tattoo (1950), Cat on
a Hot Tin Roof (1955), Night of the Iguana (1961), and many others. Cat on a Hot Tin
Roof won Williams his second Pulitzer Prize, and was his last truly great artistic and
commercial success.
He gave American theatergoers unforgettable characters, an incredible vision of life in the
South, and a series of powerful portraits of the human condition. He was deeply
interested in something he called "poetic realism," namely the use of everyday objects
which, seen repeatedly and in the right contexts, become imbued with symbolic meaning.
His plays also seemed preoccupied with the extremes of human brutality and sexual
behavior: madness, rape, incest, nymphomania, as well as violent and fantastic deaths.
Williams himself often commented on the violence in his own work, which to him
seemed part of the human condition; he was conscious, also, of the violence in his plays
being expressed in a particularly American setting. As with the work of Edward Albee,
critics who attacked the "excesses" of Williams' work often were making thinly veiled
attacked on his sexuality. Homosexuality was not discussed openly at that time, but in
Williams' plays the themes of desire and isolation reveal, among other things, the
influence of having grown up gay in a homophobic world.
The sixties brought hard times for Tennessee Williams. He had become dependent on
drugs, and the problem only grew worse after the death of Frank Merlo in 1961. Merlo's
death from lung cancer sent Williams into a deep depression that lasted ten years.
Williams was also insecure about his work, which was sometimes of inconsistent quality,
and he was violently jealous of younger playwrights.
His sister Rose was in his thoughts during his later work. The later plays are not
considered Williams' best, including the failed Clothes for a Summer Hotel. Overwork
and drug use continued to take their toll on him, and on February 23, 1983, Williams
choked to death on the lid of one of his pill bottles.
He left behind an impressive body of work, including plays that continue to be performed
the world over. In his worst work, his writing is melodramatic and overwrought, but at his
best Tennessee Williams is a haunting, lyrical, and powerful voice, and one of the most
important forces in twentieth-century American drama.

39

Biography of Arthur Miller (1915-2005)

Arthur Miller was one of the leading American playwrights of the twentieth century. He
was born in October 1915 in New York City to a women's clothing manufacturer, who
lost everything in the economic collapse of the 1930s. Living through young adulthood
during the Great Depression, Miller was shaped by the poverty that surrounded him. The
Depression demonstrated to the playwright the fragility and vulnerability of human
existence in the modern era. After graduating from high school, Miller worked in a
warehouse so that he could earn enough money to attend the University of Michigan,
where he began to write plays.
Miller's first play to make it to Broadway, The Man Who Had All the Luck (1944), was a
dismal failure, closing after only four performances. This early setback almost
discouraged Miller from writing completely, but he gave himself one more try. Three
years later, All My Sons won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award as the best play
of 1947, launching Miller into theatrical stardom. All My Sons, a drama about a
manufacturer of faulty war materials, was strongly influenced by the naturalist drama of
Henrik Ibsen. Along with Death of a Salesman (his most enduring success), All My Sons
and The Man Who Had All the Luck form a thematic trilogy of plays about love triangles
involving fathers and sons. The drama of the family is at the core of all of Miller's major
plays, but nowhere is it more prominent than in the realism of All My Sons and the
impressionism of Death of a Salesman.
Death of a Salesman (1949) secured Miller's reputation as one of the nation's foremost
playwrights. Death of a Salesman mixes the tradition of social realism that informs most
of Miller's work with a more experimental structure that includes fluid leaps in time as
the protagonist, Willy Loman, drifts into memories of his sons as teenagers. Loman
represents an American archetype, a victim of his own delusions of grandeur and
obsession with success, which haunt him with a sense of failure.
Miller won a Tony Award for Death of a Salesman as well as a Pulitzer Prize. The play
has been frequently revived in film, television, and stage versions that have included
actors such as Dustin Hoffman, George C. Scott and, most recently, Brian Dennehy in the
part of Willy Loman.
Miller followed Death of a Salesman with his most politically significant work, The
Crucible (1953), a tale of the Salem witch trials that contains obvious analogies to the
McCarthy anti-Communist hearings in 1950s America. The highly controversial nature of
the politics of The Crucible, which lauds those who refuse to name names, led to the
play's mixed response. In later years, however, it has become one of the most studied and
performed plays of American theater.
Three years after The Crucible, in 1956, Miller found himself persecuted by the very
force that he warned against, when he was called to testify before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee. Miller refused to name people he allegedly saw at a

40
Communist writers' meeting a decade before, and he was convicted of contempt. He later
won an appeal.
Also in 1956, Miller married actress Marilyn Monroe. The two divorced in 1961, one
year before her death. That year Monroe appeared in her last film, The Misfits, which is
based on an original screenplay by Miller. After divorcing Monroe, Miller wed Ingeborg
Morath, to whom he remained married until his death in 2005. The pair had a son and a
daughter.
Miller also wrote the plays A Memory of Two Mondays and the short A View from the
Bridge, which were both staged in 1955. His other works include After the Fall (1964), a
thinly veiled account of his marriage to Monroe, as well as The Price (1967), The
Archbishop's Ceiling (1977), and The American Clock (1980). His most recent works
include the plays The Ride Down Mt. Morgan (1991), The Last Yankee (1993), and
Broken Glass (1993), which won the Olivier Award for Best Play.
Although Miller did not write frequently for film, he did pen an adaptation for the 1996
film version of The Crucible starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Winona Ryder, which
garnered him an Academy Award nomination. Miller's daughter Rebecca married DayLewis in 1996.