The short story “Indian Camp” is written by Ernest Hemingway. It is written in 1921 and takes place in North America.
“Indian Camp” is about a young boy named Nick, who travels with his father and Uncle George to an Indian Camp to help an Indian girl, who has been in a painful labor for two days. Nick’s father performs a very primitive cesarean, and in meantime the woman's husband commits suicide by cutting his throat.
My intention with this essay is first to make a charactersation of the most important characters of the story. Afterwards I would like to make a short analysis of the structure, narrator and language. And at last I intend to make an interpretation of the theme of “Indian Camp”.
The main character of the story is Nick, and the description of him is made implicit. We know that he is a boy, who has a great relationship with his father: “Nick lay back with his father’s arm around him.” p.1, l.9. He is a young boy, about 8-10 years, because he is old enough to see the cesarean, but not the suicide. Nick is very brave, because he tackles the whole situation without crying and screaming. He thinks a lot and reflex on life, which is seen in the end, when he keeps asking about life and death. Nick is a complex character, because he goes through a development. In the beginning of the story he is sitting next to his father in the stern of the boat, and he doesn’t really know what a birth is, but in the end he is sitting in front of his father in the boat and is sure about what life is.
Nick’s father is a flat character. He is middle-age since he has a son and a long education. He is proud of being a doctor, which is seen, when he teaches Nick about the birth. He cares a lot about his son, because he apologize him for taking him to the Indian Camp. He wants to avoid making him nervous, so he only tells him a few necessary things about the trip.
Uncle George doesn’t have an active role in the story. But it seems as if he has a friendly