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Title: For Whom the Bell Tolls
Author: Ernest Hemingway
Genre: Classic literature (war novels)
Thingummies: 5
Synopsis: American idealist Robert Jordan came to Spain to fight the Fascists in the Spanish Civil War. Long after his idealism has been reduced to pragmatism, he is ordered to blow up a bridge with a group of guerillas hiding in the hills. His increasingly personal involvement with the group, especially the beautiful and traumatized Maria, threatens his mission. A searing picture of the brutality of war.
Thoughts: There's a certain arrogance required to review one of the great classics of modern literature. Suffice it to say that this book deserves its accolades. It's stylish, bold, engaging, and understandably revolutionary. There's also an actual plot. This is what literary fiction wants to grow up to be, and usually fails.
So we'll move on to my personal response rather than a general critique. I'll admit, I tend to find Hemingway a bit distancing, with his very deliberately simple use of language. The fact that the first book of his I read, The Sun Also Rises, was primarily about disaffected people unable to cope with their own emotions, certainly contributed a lot to this impression. For Whom the Bell Tolls has a significantly more emotional protagonist who's a lot easier to identify with, avoiding some of that coldness. Even so, I can't think of a single other writer who can use such sparse, stripped down prose and still be so descriptive. He packs more into word choice than almost anyone else.
The language takes some getting used to, though. The characters are mostly talking to each other in a hill dialect of Spanish, which combines with the conventions of the period he was writing in along with Hemingway's own style to end with some really weird dialogue that takes some getting used to. I spent the first chapter wanting to shake the characters and scream "Use some contractions, damn you!" Also, this hails from a period where "unprintable" really meant it. These are peasants and villagers and soldiers fighting a brutal war--they curse a blue streak. Only, he can't actually write out the curses. So you'll have exchanges that consist literally of "I obscenity in thy milk." "Thy mother!" As Hemingway clearly has certain obscenities in mind, I spent some time entertaining myself trying to figure out whether he had specific English or Spanish curse he meant and if so, what it might be.
Also jarring is the name Robert Jordan. For the first two or three chapters, I couldn't help but wonder what the fantasy author was doing in early twentieth century Spain.
Maria, the love interest, is basically useless and has a nice little virgin/whore thing going. Robert's relatively enlightened about the whole thing, though. And Pilar is so casually awesome that I'm willing to cut Hemingway some slack. Poor Maria might be two-dimensional, but Pilar proves that Hemingway does think women are good for a lot more than just their sexuality.
Really, this book shows what so many books aspire to and fail. There's the careful style and characterization of literary fiction, but with a strong plot and no pretentious navel-gazing. There's a deep understanding of methods of warfare and quite a lot of unabashed machoism, but no need for the endless repetitions of weapon statistics or posturing most military novels obsess over. These are manly men without a doubt, but they have rich internal lives that Clive Cussler would never even conceive of. Hemingway is realistically cynical about war, but equally realistic about when it is called for as well as what it does to the combatants.
Is this a fun book? Of course not. But it's a beautiful one. And oddly enough, has some of the most perfect descriptions of sex I've seen, without ever mentioning a single body part. It's done in a way that could never be duplicated without being obviously derivative, but he so captures the incoherent yearning that it's rather amazing. And really, that sums up the novel as a whole. Imitation will always fall flat.
Author: Ernest Hemingway
Genre: Classic literature (war novels)
Thingummies: 5
Synopsis: American idealist Robert Jordan came to Spain to fight the Fascists in the Spanish Civil War. Long after his idealism has been reduced to pragmatism, he is ordered to blow up a bridge with a group of guerillas hiding in the hills. His increasingly personal involvement with the group, especially the beautiful and traumatized Maria, threatens his mission. A searing picture of the brutality of war.
Thoughts: There's a certain arrogance required to review one of the great classics of modern literature. Suffice it to say that this book deserves its accolades. It's stylish, bold, engaging, and understandably revolutionary. There's also an actual plot. This is what literary fiction wants to grow up to be, and usually fails.
So we'll move on to my personal response rather than a general critique. I'll admit, I tend to find Hemingway a bit distancing, with his very deliberately simple use of language. The fact that the first book of his I read, The Sun Also Rises, was primarily about disaffected people unable to cope with their own emotions, certainly contributed a lot to this impression. For Whom the Bell Tolls has a significantly more emotional protagonist who's a lot easier to identify with, avoiding some of that coldness. Even so, I can't think of a single other writer who can use such sparse, stripped down prose and still be so descriptive. He packs more into word choice than almost anyone else.
The language takes some getting used to, though. The characters are mostly talking to each other in a hill dialect of Spanish, which combines with the conventions of the period he was writing in along with Hemingway's own style to end with some really weird dialogue that takes some getting used to. I spent the first chapter wanting to shake the characters and scream "Use some contractions, damn you!" Also, this hails from a period where "unprintable" really meant it. These are peasants and villagers and soldiers fighting a brutal war--they curse a blue streak. Only, he can't actually write out the curses. So you'll have exchanges that consist literally of "I obscenity in thy milk." "Thy mother!" As Hemingway clearly has certain obscenities in mind, I spent some time entertaining myself trying to figure out whether he had specific English or Spanish curse he meant and if so, what it might be.
Also jarring is the name Robert Jordan. For the first two or three chapters, I couldn't help but wonder what the fantasy author was doing in early twentieth century Spain.
Maria, the love interest, is basically useless and has a nice little virgin/whore thing going. Robert's relatively enlightened about the whole thing, though. And Pilar is so casually awesome that I'm willing to cut Hemingway some slack. Poor Maria might be two-dimensional, but Pilar proves that Hemingway does think women are good for a lot more than just their sexuality.
Really, this book shows what so many books aspire to and fail. There's the careful style and characterization of literary fiction, but with a strong plot and no pretentious navel-gazing. There's a deep understanding of methods of warfare and quite a lot of unabashed machoism, but no need for the endless repetitions of weapon statistics or posturing most military novels obsess over. These are manly men without a doubt, but they have rich internal lives that Clive Cussler would never even conceive of. Hemingway is realistically cynical about war, but equally realistic about when it is called for as well as what it does to the combatants.
Is this a fun book? Of course not. But it's a beautiful one. And oddly enough, has some of the most perfect descriptions of sex I've seen, without ever mentioning a single body part. It's done in a way that could never be duplicated without being obviously derivative, but he so captures the incoherent yearning that it's rather amazing. And really, that sums up the novel as a whole. Imitation will always fall flat.
