I read The old man and the sea when I was a kid and it was just a nice story. Years later I heard something about it being a metaphor for something and it made a lot of sense to me.
Now I just can’t remember what the metaphor was. Couldn’t get anywhere by searching the web. In fact I found a quote where EH said something like: The man is a man. The boat is a boat…
Back in high school in my Lit class, one of my friends told the teacher that if he ever wrote a story that became famous, he was going to include the following foreword:
Literature teachers everywhere, please take note: This story does not have any hidden meanings. Nothing in this story is a metaphor for anything else. It’s just an interesting story, and any deep or profound meanings you find are purely your own invention.