For Whom The Bell Tolls Thesis Statement

For whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway is considered by many to be his greatest novel. This simple story of an American who travels to Spain during the Spanish civil war takes place over a three-day period. It is impossible to not recognize the personal connection that Hemmingway had to the Spanish Civil War and to this novel. Hemmingway served three years as a correspondent in Spain. He was highly invested in the Spanish Civil War, and is quoted in an essay written by Zivah Perel saying, “For a long time both me and my conscience have know that I had to go to Spain”. Furthermore in Perel’s essay, he explains how Hemmingway enjoyed this book so much that he self proclaimed it as his “best goddamn book”.

Robert Jordan, an American Spanish

Jordan recognizes that he will not be able to live a long happy life with Maria and defeat the Fascist army. He understands that he will not be able to fulfill either of those fantasies. In this sense, Robert Jordan is not your typical 20th century hero. Generally, we think of heroes as someone or something that is greater than human, incapable of failure or death. Robert Jordan is not like that, he is capable of failure and capable of death, he is not greater than ourselves nor his environment; he is the perfect example of Northrop Frye’s “Low Mimetic Hero”, he represents “common humanity”. Though Jordan died at the end of the novel, he died a hero. He made the sacrifice of death for the cause of the war and for the women with no other choice.

Robert Jordan is a hero that is one of us. Over the three-day period that the novel takes place, he undergoes more change than most people go through over a lifetime. He starts as an unattached war tool that sees himself as a means to an end and over the three-day period transitions into a passionate lover who is willing to die for what he believes. The internal struggles that Jordan faces throughout the novel, his conflicts between the social and personal goods, prove his low mimetic