Home > For Whom the Bell Tolls Summary & Study Guide > Essays and Criticism > A Linguistic Analysis of Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls

For Whom the Bell Tolls | A Linguistic Analysis of Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls

In the following essay, R. Moore examines Hemingway’s use of language in the novel and his purposes for employing such language.

Many critics have pointed out that Hemingway’s language in For Whom the Bell Tolls is one of the weaknesses of the book. His language was intended to be the intimate expression of the intellectual hero Jordan and also to present the local idiom of the Spanish fighters. Some argue that the meditations of Jordan are turgid and the “Platonic language composed of the Spanish idiom, the Bible, and the Elizabethans . . . is . . . Weighed down with overmuch local color.”(1) Hemingway attempts, through language, to capture the spirit of a nation and, despite any weaknesses...

[The entire page is 1353 words long]

Join eNotes

The above is a free excerpt. Get total access to this content with the:

Summary and Analysis – Themes – Characters – And much more...