Nice to meet you, Mr. Hemingway.

Alright, I’ll admit it: I’d never read Hemingway. But back off, I’m sure you’ve never read Quevedo or Gongora.


So I started reading “The old man and the sea” this past Saturday and finished on Sunday, couldn’t put it down. The narrative is so vivid that I recall passages of the book as if they were memories, instead of my imagination. I don’t know what Hemingway’s point was when he wrote it, but to me it represented –however grandiose it may sound- the triumph of the human spirit over adversity and how all noble effort is good in itself. If I evaluate the story as an accountant, he ran a tremendous loss, in fact, he’s a complete failure, but only because what he gained in self-respect (and from others) is intangible and cannot be measured in dollars and cents. It’s an excellent read, one of my favorites as of yet. I heartily recommend it.

It’s now turn Mr. Halldór Laxness, Icelandic, who won it in 1955.