1) how does setting function in a story? 2)What is the theme of the story? What in the story suggests this theme? 3)What role does setting play in...

Here are some
additional observations on setting and theme:

Setting:

The significance of the setting of
Hemingway's story is certainly suggested in the fact that it is given the priority of being the
title. The "clean, well-lighted place" serves the lonely old man as a refuge from the
nothingness of life and the bleakness of his own life. He is reluctant to leave the cafe because
he feels sheltered from the "nada" while he is in the lighted and clean cafe, and he
can forget temporarily his alienated condition. This condition the old waiter understands as he,
too, has nothing as a way of life:  

It was a nothing that
he knew too well. It was all a nothing and a man was nothing too. It was only that and light was
all it needed and a certain cleanness and order.

He tells
the young waiter, "Each night I am reluctant to close up because there may be some one who
needs the cafe." For, cleanliness, light, and order act as defenses against the horror of
the "nada," the nothingness to life. And, coming to the "clean, well-lighted
place" as a routine gives some meaning to the old man.

Certainly,
setting is the most important element of this story since it carries implications that extend to
both character and theme. 

Theme:

After the disillusionment and destruction of World War II, Hemingway feels that the
future can only find value if new and better values, purer values could be established from the
disorder of the world. This is the meaning of theof the "Our Father":

Give us this nada our
daily nada and nada us
our nada as
we nada ournadas and nada us not
into nada but deliver us from nada; pues
nada. Hail nothing....

Out of nothing,
perhaps, ethical conduct and order can be re-established. For, without attachments, humanity may
be able to attain a level of virtue, and thus, nothing can become the only
"order."

Another interpretation of the old man is that he is
symbolic of the old values and psychology. Now effete and in despair, like the Germans and
Allied Forces alike, the old man comes to the well-lighted place in order to clear his mind of
the dark confusion of thought in the aftermath of war. Unable to make sense of the horrors of
war, all that the old man (the war-weary countries) can do is hold at bay the
"nada"--the negative experiences--that threatens to disillusion and overcome
him.