What Does A Clean Well-Lighted Place Mean

For Lack of Meaning

"A Clean, Well-Lighted Place", gives us a rather bleak but fair outlook on the world. Ernest

Hemingway takes us back to a time where it seems as though people and their lack of value for one

another, and life itself, are at their peak. Although there are many exceptions, in our present day and

age, the vast majority of us also lack the presence of a deeper meaning and value in our own lives as

well as one another 's.

The way in which the waiters gossip to one another about the old man they barely know, leaves

us with a rather ominous feeling. As they carry out a conversation amongst themselves, the waiter

It is widely spread in our society that we must be somebody; somebody good, strong, attractive,

entertaining, talented and wealthy. So many of us have so much pressure put on our shoulders to be

someone of value. As soon as no one seems to value us, we lose value in ourselves. It is the sad reality

of it and most definitely the reasoning behind why the old man had tried to kill himself; he felt alone

and without purpose or value. Like many of us feel.

If anything, the search for a deeper meaning has become a passionate search throughout the years

for many. But in "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place", there seems to not be much of a search happening, but

rather a depressing acceptance behind lack of meaning and nothingness. Today, it feels like everyone is

always looking for the next best thing to define themselves and stop the empty feeling. Everyone seems

to want more to fulfill themselves, because they don 't realize that feeling they 're searching for is love.

Until we realize this, nothing will be enough to save