Give some examples of why a "Clean Well Lighted Place" has been called a story of contrasts.

An apparently
simple story with a plot that involves two waiters in a cafe who wait for their shifts to end,
the underlying philosophical message is, on the other hand, a complex existential one.
Figuratively, then, "A Clean Well-Lighted Place" is much darker than first it
appears.

Contrasts

• The young waiter is eager to join his wife, who is home in bed; the older
  waiter is "unhurried."
• The old man who remains in the cafe is
  deaf, but he knows the difference when the cafe is quiet late at night.


• When a soldier passes the cafe with a prostitute, the young waiter thinks the
  "guard will pick him up"; however, the older waiter does not think it matters,
  "What does it hurt if he gets what he is after?"
• The old man, who
  is a customer, has tried to hang himself; his niece cut him down in order to save his
  soul.
• The young waiter complains that the old man is lonely, but he is not
  because he has a wife waiting in bed for him.
• When the young waiter
  complains that the old man is "a nasty thing," the older waiter disabuses him of this
  opinion: "This old man is clean. He drinks without spilling. Even now,
  drunk."
• After the old man is told he must go home, he pays and then
  walks down the street, "unsteadily, but with dignity."
• The older
  waiter asks the younger one why he would not allow the old man to stay another hour; the younger
  replies that he can drink at home. "It is not the same," the older one
  counters.
• "You have youth, confidence, and a job," the older
  waiter tells the younger waiter. "You have everything." The younger one asks,
  "And what do you lack?" "Everything but work," says the older
  waiter.
• The older waiter tells the younger one that he, too, likes to stay
  late at the cafe..."With all those who do not want to go to bed. With all those who need a
  light for the night." The younger observes, "I want to go home and into
  bed."
• The older waiter tells the younger that they "are two
  different kinds." He adds that the reason he is reluctant to close at night is the fact
  that someone may need the cafe. The younger waiter does not understand because "there are
  bodegas open all night long."
• But, the older one
  points out that the light is excellent at their cafe, and there is a pattern from the shadows of
  the leaves. (light/shadow)
• The older waiter is not afraid, but recognizes
  "It was a nothing that he knew too well." The mystery of humanity is indicated by the
  waiter's use of the word nada, nothing.  Yet, it is not really nothing,
  this existential condition of man; it is only that there are verbal limitations for man to
  describe it. 

From this contrasting exchange between the younger
and older waiters, the reader discerns that the older waiter comprehends, and even senses, what
the old man does; namely, the meaninglessness of life. It is up to the individual to create his
own meaning out of absurdity through patterns such as the shadows of the leaves, as well as
through simple and habitual, ordered activities because routine makes life predictable, thus
affording it some meaning. The other waiter simply acts in an animalistic form, satisfying his
sensual instincts.