One for the classic lit lovers to identify

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

Should be a very easy one for all you first-year book geeks!

--

But by 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 that their fins made and their phosphorescence as they threw themselves on the fish. He clubbed at heads and heard the jaws chop and the shaking of the skiff as they took hold below. He clubbed desperately at what he could only feel and hear and he felt something seize the club and it was gone.

He jerked the tiller free from the rudder and beat and chopped with it, holding it in both hands and driving it down again and again. But they were up to the bow now and driving in one after theother and together, tearing off the pieces of meat that showed glowing below the sea as they turned to come once more.

One came, finally, against the head itself and he knew that it was over. He swung the tiller across the shark’s head where the jaws were caught in the heaviness of the fish’s head which would not tear. He swung it once and twice and again. He heard the tiller break and he lunged at the shark with the splintered butt. He felt it go in and knowing it was sharp he drove it in again. The shark let go and rolled away. That was the last shark of the pack that came. There was nothing more for them to eat.

The old man could hardly breathe now and he felt a strange taste in his mouth. It was coppery and sweet and he was afraid of it for a moment. But there was not much of it. He spat into the ocean and said, “Eat that, galanos. And make a dream you’ve killed a man.”

[Rabrrrrrr]

1. Got it!

Highlight to read it:
Old Man and the Sea, Hemingway. One of America's greatest writers, IMO.

[SOteric]

4. Doh!

[Rabrrrrrr]

5. At least you are neither slapping me nor slinging snowballs at me

I can handle a bronx cheer.

[SOteric]

7. I'm keeping the 'thwappings' and the snow balls in reserve.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

6. Damn! I knew it would be a quick one, but

two minutes? Guess I'll have to try harder!

Stanislaw Lem, perhaps? --Nah, gotta be harder... :evilgrin:

[Rabrrrrrr]

8. You offered a lot of text,

and even though I had it with the first paragraph, you also included the paragraph that mentions "the old man", which, for anyone who wasn't quite sure, would surely cinch it up. Less text will makeit more challenging.

Obviously, we don't want to go down to the point of offering "and" or "man" as the text to go with, but you get the picture.

[SOteric]

2. Ernest Hemingway. "The Old Man and the Sea."

[Fenris]

3. Old Man and the Sea

Read it when I was eleven.

[politicat]

9. Ack! Flashbacks! I HATE Hemingway. Choppy sentences. Think how much

better he could have written if he'd been sober.

I'm twitching. Ick.

Politicat (who considers ol' Ern highly over-rated and puts him in the same category as Zane Grey and Louis L'amour. Pulp. And admits she's a lit snob, too.)