the champion as a title

The champion as a title in The Old Man and the Sea is a concept that crystallizes Santiago's past peak of physical prowess and public recognition, earned in a legendary hand game, and it functions as a measure of his present endurance and a source of identity that he must prove anew against the marlin, contrasting his current luckless state with his former glory.

Origin and the Hand Game

The title of champion was won by Santiago in a celebrated arm-wrestling match in a tavern in Casablanca against the great negro from Cienfuegos, who was the strongest man on the docks. The contest lasted one day and one night, with their elbows on a chalk line on the table and their forearms straight up, hands gripped tight. Blood came out from under the fingernails of both men. The match started on a Sunday morning and ended on a Monday morning. At daylight, when the bettors were asking for a draw and the referee was shaking his head, Santiago unleashed his effort and forced the negro's hand down until it rested on the wood. For a long time after that, everyone called him The Champion, and he was known as Santiago El Campeon. There was a return match in the spring, which he won quite easily since he had broken the confidence of the negro from Cienfuegos in the first match. After that, he had a few more matches and then no more, deciding that he could beat anyone if he wanted to badly enough and that it was bad for his right hand for fishing.

The Title as a Measure of Present Endurance

During his struggle with the great marlin, Santiago consciously invokes the champion as a title to measure his own capacity for suffering and endurance. He tells himself, "I told the boy I was a strange old man," and then declares, "Now is when I must prove it." He reflects that the thousand times he had proved it meant nothing; each time was a new time, and he never thought about the past when he was doing it. The title thus becomes a standard of self-expectation, not a resting on past laurels. He thinks of the great DiMaggio, who does all things perfectly even with the pain of a bone spur in his heel, and wonders if DiMaggio would stay with a fish as long as he will, concluding that he is sure he would and more since he is young and strong. This comparison links the champion's title to a broader code of heroic performance under duress.

The Title and the Code of the Fisherman

The concept of the champion as a title is intertwined with Santiago's philosophy of struggle and his identity as a fisherman. He believes that "a man can be destroyed but not defeated," a principle that the champion's title embodies. When he feels himself going during the final turns with the fish, he takes "all his pain and what was left of his strength and his long gone pride" and puts it against the fish's agony. The title is not merely a past achievement but a living code that demands he prove himself worthy of it through action. He thinks, "I will show him what a man can do and what a man endures," and later, facing the fish, he says, "You are killing me, fish... But you have a right to. Never have I seen a greater, or more beautiful, or a calmer or more noble thing than you, brother." This recognition of the fish's nobility elevates the contest, making the champion's title a matter of mutual respect between worthy adversaries.

The Title's Thematic Significance

The champion as a title ultimately signifies the gap between public recognition and private truth. Santiago's past glory is known to the community—the older fishermen look at him with sadness, and the boy Manolin remembers his great record of eighty-seven days without fish followed by three weeks of big ones. Yet the title is also a burden that isolates him, as he must prove it alone, far out at sea, without witnesses. The dream of the lions on the beach, which recurs throughout the story, represents a purer, more primal form of the champion's spirit—a state of being that transcends the need for a title. In the end, when the skeleton of the marlin is mistaken by a tourist for a shark, the champion's true victory remains invisible to the world, known only to Santiago and the boy who sits by him as he dreams of the lions.