The Old Man and the Sea

 The day before yesterday, during the first hour, our professor taught us about the novel. He asked us how many novels we had already read, and one of my friends mentioned some of the novels she had read. I am actually on track of  reading my first novel. He mentioned The Old Man and the Sea-"Man can be destroyed but not defeated"- and asked us whether anyone among us had read it. But no one had read the novel, and our professor started narrating the summary of the novel. When he mentioned the character Santiago, it struck my memory. It appeared that I had heard this name before. When he continued his narration, I caught the storyline and remembered that I read its short summary in a Tamil textbook as a supplementary reader. I told my class about this, and one of my friends, who was in a bit of doubt, asked me whether it was there in the textbook in her sign language. I replied yes to her in the same sign language. Then I started to think why she didn't know it. Then I realized that it was actually in the new syllabus textbook, but we studied the old syllabus one. Let me narrate the storyline very shortly.

There was a fisherman named Santiago. He is an efficient man at fishing. But for the past eighty days, he didn't get any fish. There was also a little boy named Manolin who went with this old man to learn fishing. His parents sent him to another boat when they came to know that Santiago didn't get any fish. After that, he went for fishing alone. It was on his eighty fifth day that he was fishing, but he didn't get any fish. After some time, a giant fish was caught on his bait, but it was trying hard to get out of it. It was an evening, but Santiago didn't withhold his hope. He didn't eat, and he didn't sleep. At last, after three days of struggle, Santiago killed the fish with a harpoon thrust. He tied the fish to the side of the boat. Somehow, he came out of all the struggles he had and came to the shore. Once he reached the shore, he was shocked because, except the head portion, only the skeleton of the fish remained. He felt very sad. At this time, Manolin came to see Santiago. He told him how giant that fish was. He appreciated the Goldman's talent. Santiago felt a little happy and replied to him that only the skeleton of the fish remains. Manolin told him that his consistency and talent had won everything. He also told him that hereafter he would come with him for fishing.

Sometimes, even though we exhibit our talents, in return, we don't get what we deserve. But there will be people, like Manolin, who know how valuable we are. Even though everyone criticized Santiago, Manolin didn't. He knew Santiago's talent more than anyone.