Table of Contents
What is the hills look like white elephants about?
Ernest Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants” tells the story of a man and woman drinking beer and anise liqueur while they wait at a train station in Spain. The man is attempting to convince the woman to get an abortion, but the woman is ambivalent about it.
Who claims that the hills look like white elephants?
In the story, Hemingway refers to the Ebro River and to the bare, sterile-looking mountains on one side of the train station and to the fertile plains on the other side of the train station. The hills of Spain, to the girl, are like white elephants in their bareness and round, protruding shape.
What does the white elephant symbolize in Hills Like White Elephants?
A white elephant symbolizes something no one wantsin this story, the girl’s unborn child. Comparing the hillsand, metaphorically, the babyto elephants also recalls the expression the elephant in the room, a euphemism for something painfully obvious that no one wants to discuss. …
What is the symbolism of a white elephant?
The white elephantwhich was more often than not stricken with albinism, and thus more a ruddy-pink colorwas, and remains to this day, a symbol of success. To possess a white elephant connoted political power, wealth and prosperity, great wisdom, and the love of one’s people.
Are White Elephants good luck?
This is to invite good luck and dispel bad fortune. In Southeast Asia, white elephants are considered omens of good fortune and political change in Thailand, Myanmar, and Cambodia. Indeed, the Hindu God Ganesh has the body of a man but the head of an elephant; hence he is both the symbol for power and authority.
What is the main point of Hills Like White Elephants?
Hemingway sets “Hills Like White Elephants” at a train station to highlight the fact that the relationship between the American man and the girl is at a crossroads.
What is the time period of Hills Like White Elephants?
Hemingway wrote “Hills Like White Elephants” in 1926 while living in Paris. Europe between the First and Second World Wars provided the historical and cultural context for the story. Hemingway was twenty-two, newly married and ready to begin a career as a serious writer when he arrived in Paris in 1921.
What literary devices are used in Hills Like White Elephants?
In “Hills Like White Elephants,” Ernest Hemingway uses the literary devices of symbolism and euphemism.
What does the luggage symbolize in Hills Like White Elephants?
From the perspective of Jig, the clouds that look like white elephants symbolize the baby she is carrying. The American thinks the baby is extra luggage – expensive luggage. He does not want to have the responsibility and takes their luggage to the barren side to continue the journey and the lifestyle of their past.
What is the irony in Hills Like White Elephants?
The irony in “Hills Like White Elephants” is that the man insists that an abortion will restore their relationship to its former goodness,…
What is the conflict in Hills Like White Elephants?
The main conflict in the story “Hills Like White Elephants ” is the debate between the man and his girlfriend Jig over whether or not to abort their unborn baby that Jig is carrying. The man obviously wants—and pressures—Jig to have an abortion while Jig is reluctant to go through with the procedure.
What happens at the end of Hills Like White Elephants?
The ending of Hemingway’s 1927 story, “Hills Like White Elephants” was interpreted for decades in one way: the female protagonist surrenders to her partner’s wishes that she undergo abortion. Around 1980, new readings of the story’s ending story began to appear.
What does absinthe symbolize?
Absinthe, an alcoholic drink introduced to France in the 1840s, developed a decadent though violent reputation. To some the drink symbolized creativity and liberation, and to others, madness and despair.
What is the point of the girl’s comparison of the hills to white elephants?
The point of the girls’ comparison of the hills to white elephants indirectly represents her wanting of keeping the baby. White elephants are something that no one wants. She first compares them to the hills because she doesn’t want to keep the baby.
How do the hills in the story spotlight jig’s decision?
Answer: The hills in the story spotlight Jig’s decision by showing her pregnancy. Explanation: The symbolism of the white elephants emphasizes the subject of the story.
What does Hill’s symbolize?
Hills which are like white elephants represent a belly of a pregnant woman. It describes the state of the couple’s relationship if their unplanned pregnancy results in death. Things can’t go back to the way they were, their lives will always be impacted by the decision to carry out the abortion.
What does the bead curtain symbolize in Hills Like White Elephants?
Strings of beads are familiar infant’s playthings; thus, to the woman the curtain may symbolize the unborn child. Such a thought would be no less likely in her mind, as she handles the beads, than her earlier perception of the distant hills as white elephants.
What does four reales mean?
The Real (plural: Reales) is a unit of Spanish currency used from the mid-14th century to 1864, when it was replaced by the escudo, and then by the peseta in 1860 (Wikipedia). The word, however, still had meaning: a real was one-fourth of a peseta, similar in function to the U.S. Quarter-Dollar coin.