LITERATURE IN ENGLISH Class: 9

OLD MAN AT THE BRIDGE

This paper consists of 3 pages.

I. “Where do you come from?” I asked him.

“From San Carlos,” he said, and smiled.
That was his native town and so it gave him pleasure to mention it and he smiled.

1. Name the author. Which incident is this story based on?

→The author is Ernest Miller Hemingway. This incident is based upon an incident that took place
during an Easter Sunday stopover at the Ebro River while Hemingway was a war correspondent
covering the Spanish Civil War.

2. Describe the old man. Why was he sitting at the bridge?

→The old man wore steel rimmed spectacles and very dusty clothes and with a dusty face sat by the
side of the road.
→He was sitting at the bridge as he was too tired to go any further.

3. What type of a bridge was it and what kind of vehicles were going up and down?
→It was a pontoon bridge across the river.
→Carts, trucks and mule-drawn carts with soldiers helping push against the spokes of the wheels.

4. What duty was assigned to the soldier?

→The soldier was assigned the duty to cross the bridge, explore the bridgehead beyond and find out
to what point the enemy had advanced.

5. What was the old man doing in his native town?

→The old man was taking care of animals in his native town.

II. “Oh,” I said, not quite understanding.

“Yes,” he said, ‘I stayed, you see, taking care of animals. I was the last one to leave the town
of San Carlos.”

1. How many animals was the old man looking after? What kind of animals were they?
→The old man was looking after three (sets of) animals altogether. There were two goats and a cat
and then there were four pairs of pigeons.

2. Why did the old man have to leave his animals? Who told him to leave them?
→The old man had to leave his animals because of the artillery. The captain had told him to leave the
animals.

3. Which animal was the old man not concerned about? Why?
→The old man was not concerned about the cat. He said that the cat could look out for itself but not
the other animals.

4. What stopped the old man from moving any further? What does the author suggest instead?
→The old man was worried about his animals. He was seventy-six years old and had come twelve
kilometers.
 →The author suggested if he could make it, there were trucks up the road where it forked for Tortosa.
Those trucks would go to Barcelona.

5. Which animal could the old man not stop thinking about? Whose cage did the old man leave
unlocked? What would happen when he did so?
→The old man could not stop thinking about the goats.
→The old man left the dove cage unlocked and hence the birds would fly away.

6. What according to the author was the only good luck the old man could ever have? Why?
→According to the author, the fact that he would live one more day and the fact that the cat would
know how to look after itself was the only good luck the old man could have.
→This is because it is Easter Sunday and it was a gray overcast day with a low ceiling, so the planes
were not up. This means that the old man would probably be able to survive another day till he was
attacked by the Fascists.

III. Answer the following questions with reference to Ernest Hemmingway’s short story, ‘Old
Man at the Bridge’.

1. Explain why the narrator takes so much time to converse with the old man. Use details from the story
to support your answer.
→The narrator is a soldier on duty. He was busy supervising the evacuation of men, women and
children crossing the pontoon bridge across the river.
→He had seen the old man sitting on the side of the road.
→Soldiers helped push the mule-drawn carts up the steep bank from the bridge. Everyone was busy.
Trucks were heading out of it all and the peasants plodded along in the ankle deep dust.
→It was the narrator’s duty to cross the bridge, explore the bridgehead beyond and find out to what
point the enemy had advanced.
→When he returned over the bridge, the flow of carts and people had slowed down and he observed
once again, the old man sitting in the dust on the side of the road.
→Thus he went up to talk to him.

2. What statements from the story suggest that the old man is about to give up on life? Quote specific
statements to back your answer.
→The old man was sad having to leave behind the animals in his care.
→He feared particularly for the safety of his two goats, ‘What will they do under the artillery when I
was told to leave because of the artillery?’ he wondered aloud.
→He had no desire to leave the place. When Barcelona was suggested as a possible safe route, he
declined saying, ‘I know no one in that direction.’
→The fact that he is about to give up on his life is also reflected in his statement, ‘I am seventy-six
years old. I have come twelve kilometers now and think I can go no further.’
→There is also the affirmation that he has no family and therefore nothing to live for.

3. How does Hemmingway show that war disrupts the lives of ordinary people? Is this portrayal
realistic? Explain why you think so.
→In the story, Old Man at the Bridge, the peasants plodded along in ankle deep dust pushing their
carts as they fled the advance of the Fascists across the Ebro Delta.
→The entire village – men, women and children together with their trucks and carts were all fleeing
to the countryside.
→Pets who share a special place in people’s hearts were abandoned.
→The old man could not get over, the two goats, cat and pigeons in his care.
→War is a curse instigated by politicians, greedy for power and fame. They plunge countries into
deadly wars and it is the common man who is hardest hit.
→At the end of his age – seventy-six years, the old man had to uproot himself and walk a kilometer
to get to a place of safety. When one has run out of energy, the will to live dies and it makes no sense
to run any further.
→The portrayal is realistic, because right from the start, we get the sense of the upheaval war brings.
There is a mad stampede to escape the artillery to put as much space as possible between enemy fire
and safety.
→The bridge is crowded with vehicles of all types and hordes of peasants crossing it before it is too
late and they have to leave behind everything that they love had taken years to build for the sake of
their safety.
→Hence wars disrupt the lives of ordinary people as shown in Hemmingway’s story Old Man at the
Bridge.

*******************