"For Whom the Bell Tolls" is a 1940 novel by Ernest Hemingway. Entered the Publishers Weekly Bestseller List for 1940 and 1941 in the United States.
The work tells the story of Robert Jordan, a young American soldier of the International Brigades, who was sent to the rear of the Francoists, to the partisans, during the Spanish Civil War. As a demolition expert, he is tasked with blowing up the bridge to prevent Franco reinforcements from approaching Segovia.
"If you stop complaining and asking for what you never will get, you will have a good life. A good life is not measured by any biblical span." ― Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls
The title of the novel goes back to the sermon of the English poet and priest of the 17th century John Donne, an excerpt from which became the epigraph to the novel.
“There is no person who would be like an Island in and of itself, each person is a part of the Continent, a part of Land; and if a wave sweeps the coastal Cliff into the sea, Europe will become smaller, and so will it if it sweeps away the edge of the cape or destroys your Castle or your friend; the death of every Human belittles me too, for I am one with all Humanity, and therefore do not ask for whom the bell tolls: it tolls for You. "
Spain, May 1937. The first year of the civil war is ending. Arriving on the instructions of the command of the Republican forces in the Pablo partisan detachment, the internationalist American Robert Jordan meets Maria, a girl whose life is broken by the war. This is where the main events unfold: the clash of Pablo's reluctance to undertake a risky task and Jordan's sense of duty, as well as the conflict between Jordan's duty and his newfound zest for life, fueled by his love for Mary.
Hemingway said that, describing Maria in the novel, he imagined Ingrid Bergman, who three years later played her in the film of the same name.
Much of the novel's content is presented through the thoughts and experiences of Robert Jordan, with memories of meetings with Russians in Madrid and of his father and grandfather. Pablo's wife - Pilar - recounts events that demonstrate the horrific brutality of the civil war, in one case from the Republicans, in the other from the Francoists.
Hemingway argued that the events described in the novel are entirely the fruit of his fiction. At various times, however, allegations were made that some of the plot has documentary grounds. In particular, in the Soviet and Russian literature it was repeatedly reported that the prototype of one of the heroes of the novel was "Colonel Xanthi" - the Soviet officer Haji-Umar Mamsurov: Ilya Ehrenburg believed that "much of what Hemingway told in the novel For Whom the Bell Tolls "He took from the words of Haji about the actions of the partisans," and Roman Carmen claimed that "Ernest Hemingway spent two evenings with him at the Florida Hotel and subsequently made the brave Haji the prototype of one of the heroes of the novel." However, Mamsurov's biographer Mikhail Boltunov notes that “Hemingway endowed many of the heroes of his novel with the features of Khadzhi Mamsurov,” but the book does not speak of his direct portrayal.
Based on Hemingway's novel in 1943, directed by Sam Wood, a film of the same name was shot with Ingrid Bergman and Gary Cooper in the lead roles. The film was nominated by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for an award in nine categories: Best Picture, Best Actor (Gary Cooper), Best Actress (Ingrid Bergman), Best Supporting Actor (Akim Tamiroff), Cinematography, Artist. editing, musical accompaniment. However, only the Greek actress Katina Paksino received an Oscar as Best Supporting Actress for her portrayal of the ardent republican Pilar. The film's budget was $ 3 million.
For Whom the Bell Tolls ranks eighth on the list of Le Monde's 100 Books of the Century.
The American group Metallica in the album Ride the Lightning has a composition called "For Whom the Bell Tolls", which describes one of the episodes of the novel - the death of El Sordo's squad.
One of the central characters of the novel, the Russian demolitionist Kashkin, Hemingway gave the name of the Soviet translator and literary critic Ivan Kashkin, whose work he greatly appreciated.
Comments