A Clean Well Lighted PLace

Picture yourself, young full of life and taking in every little moment out there in life. Perhaps you haven’t really looked down the road yet; After looking down the road you can see what life comes to, loneliness. Wretchedly for the old man in A Clean Well Lighted Place the old man is essentially “down” the road. Sadly for the old man, his life has been to its mountain top, but now he’s below the bottom of the mountain where the world of loneliness comes into play as you get older and where A Clean Well Lighted Place ends up being a tragedy.

Seeing people abandoned by the world is one thing, but it’s another thing seeing an old person abandoned. The old man, now without his best friend his wife and sadly nearing the last couple years of his life, doesn’t help his loneliness at all. Also having all the money in the world doesn’t make him happy or take him out of his loneliness as some people believe money is capable of, because looking at the old man it is quite easy to see that it doesn’t do that at all. Though it is sad to hear about the old man, even though he is a character , which doesn’t make him real obviously. For example though we do have Grandparents , and when they lose their partners, your other grandparent, they are lonely. Maybe by knowing that we will turn old and possible turn lonely, we could greet them with company when we see them and treat them only how we would want to be treated when we are simply “down” the road. As we begin to go down the road, we enter the stage of a Tragedy, which is the short story’s mode of literature.

This short story’s mode of literature is a Tragedy, and by pointing out little things of the story it’s easy to see why. As any Tragedy is this story is realistic, it takes place at a café with the old man just sitting and drinking as other people do as well. The main character the old man is in control of his decisions, despite them not being the best; He drinks beer, on top of that he gets drunk, and even tried to commit suicide once. A beginning of a tragedy is that the main character is in a conflict, and the old man’s conflict is that he is lonely. After the conflict, the main character then has a rise to power which is the old man being at the café where there is light and people. Unfortunately the next thing that takes place is a tragic fall, and in this case the tragic fall is when the café has to close and the old man has to go home where he is once again lonely. At the ending of a Tragedy is death or death symbolism, and for the story the death symbolism is the man walking home in the dark all lonely by himself. Also this story teaches a lesson/purpose as a Tragedy is suppose to have; the lesson is to realize that life will have its fun moments, but it also will have its down fall, where you may be depressed, sad, or just maybe lonely.
As Tragic as it is to see an old man lonely and to think he is not the only one by himself brings sadness and misery to my mind. Perhaps all of us could take into consideration that someday we will be old and maybe lonely as well. Perhaps when we see our grandparents or an old person you could great them to brighten up their day. Perhaps you could even start a conversation with them and be their friend, and possibly cure their loneliness.