What are the conflicts in “A Clean Well Lighted Place”? The external conflict is between the young waiter and the old man and the old waiter. The young waiter wants the old man to leave so he can close the cafe and go home to his wife. The internal conflict is that the older waiter believes in nothing.

The individual’s responsibility to himself is to find a clean, well-lighted place or create one of his own. The ironic paradox of the story is that meaning can be created only through an awareness of its absence.

Life as Nothingness In “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place,” Hemingway suggests that life has no meaning and that man is an insignificant speck in a great sea of nothingness.

The climax of “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” is as quiet and subtle as the story itself. Throughout the story, the young waiter wants to close the cafe early, while the older waiter wants to remain open, at least until their regular closing time. This is the only conflict inherent in the story.

By Ernest Hemingway This super-short short story is a terrific example of Hemingway’s famous prose style. His writing is journalistic and no-nonsense; he reports dialogue cleanly and directly, without any froufy adjectives or fancy-pants descriptions.

1)The older waiter is so reluctant to go to bed because besides insomnia, he apparently is living with guilt of either doing or going through something terrible when he was younger. The nada refrain shows the old waiter has had some existential injustice against him and he no longer believes in god.

Ernest Hemingway’s short story titled “A Clean Well-Lighted place” deals with the loneliness, isolation, and depression felt by many during the modernist period. This story is the perfect example of the modernist form because it questions the meaning of life.

In conclusion, as this analyzation of “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” shows, is that Hemingway presents a clear example of the characteristics of modernism; isolation and lossas a background of war time experience and aftermath that eventually leads to the idea of existentialism, or in this case, nothingness.

The setting is a clean Spanish cafe, where two unnamed waiters — one old and one young — are discussing an old man (also unnamed) who comes every night, sits alone, and drinks brandy until past closing time. The young waiter mentions that the old man tried to commit suicide last week.

The Great Depression It was the longest economic depression ever to take place in the Western world, resulting in high unemployment rates and economic deflation. Hemingway began writing “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place” in 1926 before the Great Depression had begun. The story was finally published in 1933.

The older waiter enjoys staying late at cafés as well. He thinks it’s very important for a café to be clean and well lit, and he sees the café as a refuge from despair. Rather than admit that he is lonely, he tells himself that he has insomnia.

The younger waiter is immature and says rude things to the old man because he wants to close the café early. Unlike the older waiter, who thinks deeply—perhaps too deeply—about life and those who struggle to face it, the younger waiter demonstrates a dismissive attitude toward human life in general.

The café represents something different to the old man, the older waiter, and the younger waiter. The cleanliness and light represent an antidote to the dark night, which is when the older waiter senses “nada” the strongest.

Hover for more information. The old waiter likes to keep the cafe open until late at night because it provides a refuge or safe haven for people against the nothingness and darkness of the outer world.

The word “nada” in the story stands for the nothingness that the waiter who is not in a hurry fears.

In short stories such as “A Clean, Well-Lighted Place” the emphasis is upon light. The Hemingway code character, if he goes to sleep at night, will often leave a light on.

Character List

• The Old Man. A deaf man who likes to drink at the café late into the night.
• The Older Waiter. A compassionate man who understands why the old man may want to stay late at the café.
• The Younger Waiter. An impatient young man who cares only about getting home to his wife.

unemotional

Spanish for nothing, nada in Hemingway’s “A Clean Well-Lighted Place” represents the author’s understanding of nihilism, the belief that life is without objective meaning. Without any meaning in his life, the old man has attempted suicide, but has been saved by others.