Hills Like White Elephant Symbolism Essay

Out of the many short stories to choose from, Ernest Hemmingway’s, “Hills Like White Elephants” was most interesting to me. In this short story a man and a woman are at a train station set in Spain. The couple have just arrived and are looking to get an alcoholic beverage. The woman, who goes by Jig, is pregnant, and she is tired of drinking and wants something more out of life. The man, who is not named, insists that jig to have an abortion so he can continue drinking, and being irresponsible. Hemmingway portrays various scenery’s, objects, characters and actions as having a symbolic meaning in this short story.
As a matter of fact, one of the first symbolic phrases in Hills Like White Elephants occurs when Jig tells the man that the hills look like white elephants (McGraw 563). White elephants represent something nobody wants, in essence it symbolizes neglect. For this story, the hills symbolize the woman’s unborn baby. Further along in the story, the woman retracts her statement about the hills looking like white elephants and says they are quite lovely. This gives the reader a clue that she is going back and forth, trying to decide what she wants to do with the baby. In addition to symbols in

The man for instance, is referenced as a bull, when he drinks Anis del Toro. A bull is a masculine symbol that represents the alpha male. Whatever the man says in the relationship is law. The man in the story has no desire to settle down a form a family. He only cares about himself and his alcohol. The woman symbolizes resistance. She does not have to do what the man says. She has a voice and she has a reason. The woman will not be subjected to what the man says and she obtains a strong feminist mindset. Due to the man continuing to be irresponsible, he finds himself drinking alone. His relationship with the woman is in ashes, but yet he is still arrogant and believes he is