Ernest Hemingway has been hailed as one of the greatest American writers of all time. Ernest Miller Hemingway was born in Oak Park, Illinois, in 1899 and died in Ketchum, Idaho, in 1961. During his lifetime Ernest Hemingway published seven novels and six short story collections. Ernest Hemingway’s works tend to focus on Americans who struggle with life’s essential paradox: that our existence is what we make it, while at the same time being constrained by forces not entirely within our control.
In A Clean Well-Lighted Place Ernest Hemingway uses a rather simple story to address this issue. The setting of “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” takes place in a cafe late at night while the story’s tone shifts from past to present, depending on what the speaker is saying. The two main characters are a nameless old man and an old waiter both who have seen better days in their lives. Both men find solace in being at the cafe late at night, but only one of the men has found peace within himself.
Ernest Hemingway shows his readers that there are different ways to deal with loneliness and it seems apparent that Ernest Hemingway believes the best way is to face it head on instead of turning away from it. Ernest Hemingway begins “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” by establishing where the story takes place, in a cafe that has good lighting, paintings of bullfights, and white-aproned waiters. Ernest Hemingway then begins to describe a scene between a younger waiter and the older waiter who has been working there longer.
Ernest Hemingway uses their dialogue to establish that not only is the cafe well lit, but it is clean as well. Ernest Hemingway also shows his readers that the two men have been coming to this cafe late at night for some time now, because they are familiar with each other by name and profession. In “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” Ernest Hemingway moves back and forth between past and present tense when making observations about his characters’ lives.
Ernest Hemingway moves between tenses in order to reflect how the speaker relays information to the listener. Ernest Hemingway makes use of this device to show the difference between what the old waiter knows about Ernest Hemingway’s old man and what Ernest Hemingway’s young waiter knows about Ernest Hemingway’s old man. Ernest Hemingway also uses tenses to help his readers understand how Ernest Hemingway sees himself in relation to others, not just to other people but also animals as well because he chooses to write from an objective point of view.
Ernest Hemingway begins “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” by establishing where and when the story takes place and with whom it is taking place. Ernest Hemingway establishes a tone for both the characters and his audience by using dialogue between characters and through the use of past and present tense. Ernest Hemingway ends “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” by revealing more about Ernest Hemingway’s old man and his interactions with Ernest Hemingway’s younger waiter than Ernest Hemingway had revealed before.
The older waiter seems to be lonely while the younger one just doesn’t want to go home alone. Ernest Hemmingway uses “The old man.. ordered another brandy” followed by “put the bottle on the table and looked up at [the young waiter] inquiringly” to show how detached he is from everything. The young waiter wished him goodbye even though it was their last customer for the night, showing that they were unsympathetic towards each other. Ernest writes “He liked bars where there were a few people and where music played” which showed how his only friends are in this cafe because they play music and have a little company with a few customers.
Ernest ends this short story with “The old man looked at the bottle. He saw that it was nearly empty.. ” to show how all this man feels is emptiness, not only in his heart but also because he will soon run out of alcohol. Ernest does little things like repeating brandy so many times to create an imagery of alcoholism and loneliness in the mind of the reader. Ernest shows us how much this lonely old man drinks by writing “He sat very straight when he was asleep… ” The young waiter is portrayed as feeling superior over this lonely old man due to his age and emptiness within himself.
Ernest writes “I should go home, too, [the younger waiter] thought…” to show that he doesn’t want to feel as lonely as the old man does. Ernest writes “He was a fine-looking old man.. ” to show that this waiter sees himself as being much superior to this older gentleman. Ernest writes “and their early closing hour had not yet made him feel that it was a neighborhood cafe” Used at first, Ernest is foreshadowing that the middle of the night will be different now that it is closed.
Ernest uses “It takes more than just time to fix a place up for the night.. ” to show how bad this establishment really is because Ernest wrote ‘it isn’t very clean and what light there is comes from electric lights with pink shades (Hemingway). Ernest doesn’t like the ambiance of the cafe because Ernest writes “The two waiters were not friends. ” Ernest believes that this waiter has a superiority complex over his co-worker because Ernest writes “He would have liked it better if [the other waiter] had not been so indifferent..
However, Ernest also shows us how both characters are just waiting for their shift to end within this short story. The older waiter seems indifferent while the younger one is impatiently waiting for the lonely old man to leave. Hemingway uses repetition when Ernest wrote “… I should go home, too. ” Ernest uses past tense throughout this short story which makes the reader feel like he’s an observer in 1933 seeing these events unravel before him/herself.
Ernest uses repetition when Ernest wrote “He should go home, too. ” Ernest has a specific reason to keep repeating the word brandy because Ernest writes “put the bottle on the table and looked up at [the young waiter] inquiringly” which shows that this old man is going through an alcohol-fueled loneliness. Ernest uses “very straight” in order to show how reserved he is. Ernest writes “The old man sat very straight when he was asleep…” to show how uptight it makes him feel knowing his body is not slouching or being lazy.
