For Whom the Bell TollsIn 1937 Ernest Hemingway traveled to Spain to cover the civil war there for the North American Newspaper Alliance. Three years later he completed the greatest novel to emerge from "the good fight," For Whom the Bell Tolls. The story of Robert Jordan, a young American in the International Brigades attached to an antifascist guerilla unit in the mountains of Spain, it tells of loyalty and courage, love and defeat, and the tragic death of an ideal. In his portrayal of Jordan's love for the beautiful Maria and his superb account of El Sordo's last stand, in his brilliant travesty of La Pasionaria and his unwillingness to believe in blind faith, Hemingway surpasses his achievement in The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms to create a work at once rare and beautiful, strong and brutal, compassionate, moving and wise. "If the function of a writer is to reveal reality," Maxwell Perkins wrote to Hemingway after reading the manuscript, "no one ever so completely performed it." Greater in power, broader in scope, and more intensely emotional than any of the author's previous works, it stands as one of the best war novels of all time. |
Contents
CONTEXT | 1 |
CHARACTER LIST | 9 |
ANALYSIS OF MAJOR CHARACTERS | 15 |
Copyright | |
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Common terms and phrases
absinthe Agustín ANALYSIS SUMMARY André Marty Andrés's believe Bell Tolls blow bombing bridge operation bull bull-baiting bullfighting bureaucracy CHAPTER code hero Communist conflict despite earth move Eladio epigraph Ernest Hemingway ert Jordan explosives Fascist soldiers fear Fernando fight Finito forest Golz Golz's Gomez guerrilla band guerrilla camp guerrilla fighters guerrilleros gypsy Hemingway portrays Hemingway's horses human International Brigades Joaquín Jordan and Anselmo Jordan and Maria Jordan feels Karkov Kashkin kill Pablo killing Lieutenant Berrendo Madrid military mission moral night Pablo Pablo's camp peasants Pilar says Primitivo QUESTIONS & ESSAYS QUOTATIONS rabbits Rafael Republican cause Republican offensive Republican side REVIEW & RESOURCES rience Robert Jor Robert Jordan meets Robert Jordan thinks romantic love shoot sleep smell snow Sordo Sordo's hill Spain Spanish Civil Spanish Civil War SPARKNOTES suicide SUMMARY & ANALYSIS Sun Also Rises tells Robert Jordan tension throughout the novel tion wartime wounded