Well-lighted Place. He does not care about the old man’s needing of a clean, well-lighted place, nor does he care about the older waiter’s uneasiness about nada, but only eager to get home for his wife.
B. The Younger Waiter’s Attitude towards Nada
As the old waiter said to the young waiter in the story, “you have youth, confidence, and a job”, “you have everything.” Does he really have everything? Or he just self-assumes that he has what the social encourages, a job and home. We can find an answer through the conversation between him and the older waiter.
“Last week he tried to commit suicide,” one waiter said. “Why?”
“He was in despair.” “About what?” “Nothing.”
“How do you know it was nothing?” “He has plenty of money.”4
Though in academia, there has no consensus on which waiter said which line, most researchers and professors who study Hemingway agree that the last line of the quoted conversation is said by the younger waiter. When he talks to the older waiter about the old man’s suicide, he thinks it is nothing to commit suicide because the old man has plenty of money, which indicates that in his point of view, with money, one could live a comfortable, meaningful life. This also shows that he pursuits money. He has no idea about what is a meaningful life and how to live a meaningful life. What he cares now is money that can meet his material needs.
But in a economic-broken society, that is under the worldwide influence of American’s Great Depression, people in Spanish lives the same life that Americans do. So money seems especially essential when people are in a economic-broken society. The younger waiter does such a tedious, weary job, obvious to meet his financial
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needs. What he perceives as pleasure is identified as his wife, home and a job to pay the bills, which is approved by society because his life involves a social factor (a wife) and a material factor (a bill-paying job). So he is eager to get home for his wife in the late night, and he mentions this several times. Marriage and job are bases for the younger waiter’s illusions about life, and the society encourages that since it lets people care only about job and their family which may make them numb and oblivious to the chaotic social situations.
Of course, the younger waiter should not be criticized for chasing that. Compared with the older waiter and the old man, the younger waiter is more social and practical, but his value system lacks integrity. He is but an immoral character, presented by his apathy words about the deaf old man: “I’m sleepy now. I never get into bed before three o’clock. He should have killed himself last week”5 and when he serves the old man brandy, he says again that he should have killed yourself last week.
The younger waiter’s manner is arrogant to the old man, who, in his opinion, is useless and hopeless. He resents the old man and says, “I don’t want to look at him. I wish he would go home. He has no regard for those who must work”.6 But other researchers agree that what really makes him impatient with the old man is the old man’s antisocial behavior. Why the old, wealthy man is not satisfied with his life is beyond him. He lives his life within the social bounds and seldom does he think about how to live his life to the most. However, he thinks the old man is lonely while he is not because he has a wife waiting in bed for him. But the older waiter’s satiric question “you have no fear of going home before your usual hour?”7 makes the younger waiter upset and he replies that “are you trying to insult me?” and claims he has confidence. Instead of basing on the comprehension of himself and his interior world, his confidence is based on the transient things, like youth, a job and his self-righteous loyalty of his wife. Since these things are beyond his control, so when the older waiter indicates that his marriage may be uncertain, he becomes vulnerable. He has not realized that his so-called confidence will be gone with time passing. He invests wholly on these things, not knowing that old age can bring nothing but disappointment and disillusion. He thinks he is living a meaningful life which actually
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is the false appearance of the society.
In fact, the younger waiter is also living in a nada world, which he does not realize. He is young and knows little about the hardships and disillusions in life. He does not have the insight to see the nothingness of his life. May be he sensed the meaninglessness and nothingness in life, but chooses to ignore them. He cares not about tomorrow or his future but only about what he can get for mow. He wants to get home where he can shield himself from the rest of the world.
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Chapter II Analysis of Nihilism of the Old Man
The eighty-year-old old man, living in troubled times, must have experienced a lot in his life. Now in his old age, he penetrates the meaninglessness of life and feels disappointed and desperate. In order to escape from the great nada (nihilism), he first tried to kill himself. When failed, he begins to kill time by getting drunk and staying late in this clean and well lighted cafe, secluding himself in the shadow of the leaves of the tree.
A. The Eventful Life of the Old Man
Most of Hemingway’s works are taken from autobiographical events and the people he knew around him. Sometimes even Hemingway himself cannot distinguish what is his imagination from what is the “true stuff”. Hemingway has rich experiences about war. We can see that the wounds, fears, agonies and sufferings Hemingway had are greatly embodied in his short fictions. The generation of Hemingway’s time participated in the First World War to fight for peace and democracy, but what they saw in the battlefield was the brutality of war, like wounds, killing and death. The so-called mission, for which the soldiers sacrificed their lives turns out to be something despicable. It gradually came to Hemingway that there was no hope in war but hurt in both body and mind. He declared that there was nothing glorious in the war.
“I was always embarrassed by words sacred, glorious and sacrifice and the expression in vain.[...] and I had seen nothing sacred, and the things that were glorious had no glory and the sacrifices were like the stockyards at Chicago if nothing was done with the meat but to bury it.”8
The war he experienced has a lifelong influence on Hemingway. And his works “involve violence, physical wounding, escape and death”. The protagonists in his
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works suffer from despair, ceaseless pain and insomnia. The old man in A Clean, Well-lighted Place is typical of Hemingway’s old age characters.
Hemingway’s language and his use of symbolism greatly helped the development of the story, especially when it comes to the description of the old man. Hemingway uses short sentences and paragraphs and vigorous and positive language. The philosophy underlying his works is Iceberg Principle. Hemingway said:
“If a writer of prose knows enough about what his works is about, he may omit things that will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them. The dignity of movement of an iceberg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water. A good writer does not need to reveal every detail of a character or action.”9
In A Clean, Well-lighted Place, Hemingway used contrast and symbolism to develop the whole story.
The surroundings around and in the cafe creates the atmosphere. There is a sharp contrast between the light in the cafe and the darkness in the street. Light gives people the feeling of warmth, family love and safety; while dark makes people feel unknown, fearsome and dangerous. The old man sat “in the shadow of the leaves of the tree made against the electric light” and indulged in his world. The shadow is also a contrast with the light in the cafe. It is a place to hide himself from the world.
The old man’s deafness is a powerful symbol in this story. “The old man liked to sit late because he was deaf and now at night it was quiet and he felt the difference.10” his deafness indicates that the old man is cut off from the rest of the world, and he has no friends, family, or other social relations. He is alone and lonely.
In addition, the three main characters in the story have symbolic meanings as well. The younger waiter, the older waiter and the old man symbolize three different stages in human life: the youth, middle age and the old age. They are nameless characters. Their different attitudes towards nada in life indicate the attitudes of different generations. The image of the fast-going soldier and the girl without hat
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