July '13 / Hemingway Reading: For Whom the Bells Toll

[Scheherazade]

In July, we will be reading For Whom the Bells Tolls by Hemingway.

Please share your comments and thoughts in this thread.

[kev67]

I bought a copy today. Flicking through it, the first thing I noticed is it has a lot of dialogue, sometimes pages of it.

[Dark Muse]

That is one of the aspects of Hemingway's writing that I think sometimes causes certain mixed feelings in people about him. Personally it is something I quite enjoy about reading him. There is a certain brevity or minimalism to the way he writes which I appreciate.

I find that he is able to convey a scene quite well and really bring a moment to life without the use of excess words. I sometimes take issue with authors that are too verbose. But Hemingway knows how to really utilize the bear essentials in a way I find quite poignant. I believe he also knows how to convey human emotion very well.

In this book there is a certain abrupt, sort of matter-of-fact feel to the writing that I enjoy.

[Dark Muse]

One thing which somewhat baffles me about this book is Hemingway's use of thee and thou's it clearly does not fit in with the books time setting, and the use of it appears to be somewhat inconsistent.

[Charles Darnay]

It has to do with the translation of the Spanish dialect. Either that or it is a great satire on the notion of well spokeness.

Of all the Hemingway I have read this book has the best characters. Pablo is wonderful, as is his wife.

[Dark Muse]

I was wondering if it had something to do with the books namesake by John Donne

[Charles Darnay]

That is certainly a possibility. I'm trying to remember (and will have to look up) whether Robert Jordan uses the archaic as well, or is it just the Spanish rebels.

[Dark Muse]

At first I thought it was just the Spanish rebels but then in Chapter 4 I noticed that Robert Jordan spoke in the archaic as well.

[kev67]

I was wondering if it had something to do with the books namesake by John Donne

I haven't started reading the book yet, but I looked at the first few pages to find out how many chapters were in it. I see the book title came from a John Donne poem, the same one about no man being an island.

[Dark Muse]

I have to say that I just loved this:

"I have never heard such a tone of voice. It was grayer than a morning without sunrise"

I think that is one of the ways in which Hemingway can say so much within so few words. To me that one scentence conveys such a power of emotion. I find there is such a depth of feeling within this novel.

[kev67]

I have started reading it now. I think it's the first book I have read that is deliberately grammatically incorrect to suggest that they are speaking a foreign language. For example, there was a passage spoken by General Golz which was rather ungrammatical, but then you would expect some difficulty in understanding when the speaker is Russian, the listener is American (presumably) and neither are communicating in their native language. Another example was when Robert Jordan replies to Pablo about another bomb maker, Kashkin, "He is dead since April". I suppose it was written that way to reflect Spanish grammar. I am guessing Spanish is similar to French in that perfect tense of to die is formed with to be rather that to have.

[kev67]

I wondered about the advanced age of Anselmo. 68 seems quite an age to be carrying boxes of explosive up mountainsides. I heard a radio programme once which discussed how some Spanish civil war veterans continued fighting against the Nazis in the French Resistance during WW2. One of the British officers sent to coordinate them remarked how they were often not young, often in their fifties. I know some septuagenarians from my running club who take part in long distance runs across hilly country, so maybe 68 is not unrealistic.

The partisans described in chapter 1 seem pretty different to the POUM volunteers described by George Orwell in Homage to Catalonia.

[cafolini]

A 70-year-man completed the more than 2000-mile Apalachean trail. 68 might not be that old. Age is relative to health, not to statistics, regardless of the fact that statistics, properly used, have a lot to say.

[Dark Muse]

I wondered about the advanced age of Anselmo. 68 seems quite an age to be carrying boxes of explosive up mountainsides. I heard a radio programme once which discussed how some Spanish civil war veterans continued fighting against the Nazis in the French Resistance during WW2. One of the British officers sent to coordinate them remarked how they were often not young, often in their fifties. I know some septuagenarians from my running club who take part in long distance runs across hilly country, so maybe 68 is not unrealistic.

The partisans described in chapter 1 seem pretty different to the POUM volunteers described by George Orwell in Homage to Catalonia.

I think I read or heard somewhere once that Alexander the Great had some veteran solders who up into their 50s would still march with him in full armor traversing long distances on foot.

[kev67]

A 70-year-man completed the more than 2000-mile Apalachean trail. 68 might not be that old. Age is relative to health, not to statistics, regardless of the fact that statistics, properly used, have a lot to say.

I once met a 70+ South African who was walking from Land's End to John O' Groats, which is from the southwest tip of England to the northeast tip of Scotland. That is only about 870 miles by the most direct route, but he was carrying a heavy backpack. I met him at Glencoe in the Scottish Highlands, and he must have been an early riser, because I saw him several miles down the road trudging to Fort William the next morning. Still, he said it had taken him six months and he was still over 150 miles away from the finish, which is taking your time if you ask me.