Old Man at the Bridge: Analysis: [Essay-Type Questions]

Old Man at the Bridge: Analysis: [For Essay-Type Questions]

**For a detailed line by line explanation video of the story, click on the following link: https://youtu.be/r7mbQf9T1gE

Narrative Technique:

The narrator's engagement with the old man suddenly brings him into focus. He emerges out of the faceless, voiceless crowd. The narrator's continuous consciousness of the approaching enemy "contact" is used to create the dramatic tension between the immobility of the old man and the coming destruction as he constantly observes the movement of carts across the bridge while talking. The narrator's conversation allows the old man to have a voice.The voiceless victims speak through the old man.

Plot

In the middle of a military action, an army scout encounters an old man at a bridge where people are crossing to escape the war zone. The scout engages the old man in conversation and by the end of it, he realizes the old man is not going to move and will probably die at the bridge.

Setting

The place is a war zone at a pontoon bridge across the Ebro river during the Spanish Civil War. To know some interesting facts about the Spanish Civil War, click here: http://the-spanish-civil-war-basic-facts-easy The time is Easter Sunday 1938.

Characters

The central character is the seventy six years old man, a war refugee who has been uprooted and displaced by the war. The old man is "without politics," who was only taking care of his animals, but who has had his world destroyed. He is disoriented, confused and disconnected. He has retreated into his isolated world in which he can only cling to his obsessive thoughts about his animals, and is too tired to go any further. He will die at the bridge--another nameless innocent victim of war.

The Scout is the narrator who creates the story of the old man at the bridge. Through his telling of the story, he gradually articulates who the old man is and what he represents. The Scout at the beginning is the impersonal narrator who sees the old man and decides to engage him in conversation. By asking the old man questions about himself, the Scout gradually understands the situation of the old man. At the beginning he thinks the old man is just resting so he encourages him to move on. In the course of his conversation he realizes the old man is disoriented, displaced and that he will not be able to move on, but that he will likely die at the bridge. The scout who begins as a detached observer comes to the painful realization that "there was nothing to do about him." And he ends with the bitterly ironic observation about Easter Sunday and the old man's luck, which is no luck. The old man will soon cross that final bridge.

Symbolism

The three animals(cats, doves and goats) have a symbolic meaning in the story and reiterates the theme of futility of war. 

The cat--nine lives--the survivor.

Pigeons, which become doves in the second mentioning. Birds can fly away from the war; doves--associated with peace, which in this context is ironic. The doves will fly away.

The goats--the animals who can't escape. Sacrificial animals. Scape goats who are innocent victims.

In the course of the story, the old man is associated with his goats. The others can take care of themselves. "But the others(the goats). It's better not to think about the others." The old man is a goat figure--unable to escape, an innocent victim of the civil war.

Easter Sunday. Ironic contrast. The day of the celebration of the resurrection will be the day another innocent victim is crucified.

The four repetitions of the old man's words: "I was taking care of animals." His last repetitions: "I was only taking care of animals," "I was only taking care of animals" becomes the eloquent symbolic expression of all those voiceless innocent men, women and children who are the victims of wars they neither support nor understand. Without politics, only living in their everyday world-- taking care of animals--which is destroyed by forces beyond their ability to comprehend.

The title: "Old man at the Bridge"--that final Bridge between life and death.

Theme

Old Man at the Bridge demonstrates the power of narrative art. It takes a small, ordinary detail in a situation and by the art of story-telling transforms it into a powerful story about the tragedy of war. The old man becomes a symbol of the countless civilian victims of war-- those "without politics." The old man is going to die at the bridge--displaced, disoriented, alone. He's not a cat, nor a dove, but a goat--who was "only taking care of animals."