A Bell for Adano

by John Hersey

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Adano

Adano (AH-dah-no). Fictional town on the southern coast of Sicily, based on the island’s real town of Licata, which was one of the initial landing points of the Allied Occupation of Italy in July, 1943. The fictional town physically mirrors the actual town as a seat of shipping and the sulfur industry, as a fishing port, and even in some of its place names. The town halls of both Adano and Licata are located in squares called “Piazza Progresso,” and the principal churches of both towns are called Church of Sant’Angelo. The novel takes its name from an incident that actually occurred after Italy’s Fascist dictator, Benito Mussolini, had the real town’s seven-hundred-year-old bell melted down so its metal could be used to make munitions. John Hersey’s fictional military governor, Major Victor Joppolo, is based on the actual American military governor of Licata during the American occupation.

A typical commercial port for its time and place, Adano has a population of about forty thousand people. It is large enough to contain thirteen churches and social strata ranging from rich industrialists and politicians, both honest and corrupt, to shopkeepers, poor working people, cart-drivers, and fishermen. However, it is small enough for every resident to know everyone’s loyalties, strengths, and weaknesses. The fictional town is at the mouth of the River Rosso, surrounded by hills and rocky promontories in an arid part of Sicily and depends on water carts to carry in drinking water—a fact upon which the plot of the novel revolves.

Palazzo di Citta

Palazzo di Citta. Adano’s city hall, where much of the important action takes place, especially in Major Joppolo’s office. Located on Adano’s main square, the Piazza Progresso, the building and Joppolo’s office are described in detail in the first chapter of the book. The building both projects a look of authority and represents real authority throughout the novel. Major Joppolo’s office is also described in detail, from its oversized furniture to its painting of the incident of the Sicilian Vespers on the wall. The Palazzo is an old stone building, with a second-floor balcony that is the location of many public speeches and a clock tower with a baroque frame designed to hold a bell. However, there is no bell, and the occupied town needs a new bell as much as it needs food and fair government.

As the headquarters of Major Joppolo, the Palazzo is the scene of the townspeople’s petitions and Joppolo’s just decisions. When Joppolo announces that he will countermand an unjust order of a general, a cartman exclaims that “there has never been a thing like this—that the poor should come to the Palazzo di Citta, and that their request should be granted.” On the other hand, Tomasino, the head of the fishermen, avoids the Palazzo precisely because it represents authority to him, and he hates all authority.

Albergo dei Pescatori

Albergo dei Pescatori. Restaurant with the best food in Adano. Major Joppolo and Captain Purvis of the military police regularly eat eggplant and pasta lunches together at this restaurant. In the days before the war stopped the fishing, the Albergo specialized in fish for fishermen, and when the fishing boats are able to go out again, there are huge crowds celebrating at the restaurant. A lunch at the Albergo is the setting of the tale of the death of Giorgio, an Italian soldier and prisoner of war who had been the lover of Tina, daughter of the fisherman Tomasino and sympathetic female friend of Major Joppolo.

Villa Rossa

Villa Rossa. Quattrocchi’s grand town house, one of the finest in Adano...

(This entire section contains 692 words.)

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and a symbol of Italian culture that is filled with beautiful antiques. A number of American engineers and military police are billeted in the villa. After several soldiers get drunk and smash valuable objects, Joppolo demands that they care for the house as if each object belonged to their own mothers, thus insisting on respect for the Italian people and their culture. Later the house is the site of the farewell party in honor of Major Joppolo.

Literary Techniques

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Hersey claimed that he wrote A Bell for Adano in three weeks after going to Sicily with the American army and watching military governors coping with the problems presented by their new areas of authority. This accounts in part for the thin elements in the book. But Hersey was convinced then and throughout his life that writing should serve a moral purpose, and most of his subsequent novels present conflicts of good and evil.

A Bell for Adano is episodic in structure. As Major Joppolo meets the people he governs, the episodes are the natural results of their interactions. The forces that put an abrupt end to Joppolo's governorship are set up early in the novel. He countermands General Marvin's order that no carts will enter Adano. One of his subordinates, Captain Purvis, reports Joppolo's action to protect himself, but the report is deliberately sidetracked by other members of the staff, even sent back to North Africa at one point. Eventually, as the reader knows it must, the report catches up with Marvin, who orders the Major's removal. Before this happens, Joppolo has become a hero to the town's people, and Hersey has presented both them and him as warm characters.

Hersey based the novel on his original dispatches, adding to them the characterization of General Marvin and his other fictional touches. Most of his books are factual, drawing upon his own observations or careful research.

Social Concerns

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The effects of war on those who fight and on civilian populations as well was a concern of Hersey's from the beginning of his career. In Men of Bataan (1942) and Into the Valley (1943) his compassion for the American serviceman was obvious. In A Bell for Adano he shows the effects of an invasion on the peasant population of Sicily. Sicily had seen a number of invasions, but these invaders were American and British, quite different from those of the past who had come from other parts of the Mediterranean. They were decidedly different too from the German armies which had occupied the island and with whom the Italians had an uneasy alliance. Since 1922, Sicilian peasants had lived under a fascist dictatorship. For them the fascist salute had become a reflex action when dealing with any authority. Sicily had never known the American style of democracy. Bribes to public officials were a way of life, hated but accepted since business had never been conducted in any other way.

The Italian army did not fight well in World War II. For the second time in the century Italians had been forced into a war for which they were neither prepared psychologically nor militarily. Their soldiers were ashamed of their record, but the war for these men was over, and Hersey says, "The war aim for most men is to go home." Chapter 31 shows the reactions of returning prisoners of war and the women who are waiting for them. Hersey captures the joy of reunions well, and equally well the anguish of those women who will have no reunions. A young man, Nicolo, explains that few of the Italian soldiers were fascists, and they simply could not identify themselves with Mussolini and the group he led.

Literary Precedents

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A Bell for Adano is a first novel by a reporter and is as much a documentary account as it is a piece of fiction. Hersey the reporter received more praise than Hersey the novelist. Readers today would find the American soldier as he appeared in the dispatches of correspondents during World War II too idealized. Most of these accounts stressed the bravery of the GI in battle. The correspondents also tried to assure the families of American soldiers that their sons and fathers were living up to their expectations when not fighting. These descriptions filled the requirements of wartime propaganda. Richard Tregaski's Quadacanal Diary (1943), the dispatches of Ernie Pyle (who of all correspondents probably knew the GI's best), and Hersey's own reporting closely follow this pattern. Hersey had, after all, in his Men of Bataan presented a number of idealized portraits of American soldiers, including one of General MacArthur.

American soldiers were also praised in these reports for their relationships with the peoples whose countries they had entered. James Norman Hall's Lost Island (1943) describes the destruction of a people's way of life after an American air base is built on their island. Generally, however, the tone of wartime books was positive, stressing the benefits Americans were bestowing on war-torn or backward areas.

Adaptations

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A Bell for Adano was dramatized and became relatively successful as a Broadway play. In August 1945, Twentieth Century Fox released a film version. It is usually described as one of the better films for that year, as well as one of director Henry King's more sensitive accomplishments. The scenes depicting the replacement of Adano's town bell and of the return of its prisoners of war are very effective. The town's bell had been melted down by the military for bullets, and Joppolo commandeered one from an American warship to replace it, thus helping to restore the pride of the citizens of Adano in their town. King included newsreels to heighten the realism of his film. John Hodiak played Major Joppolo, and William Bendex his sergeant. Both were familiar to moviegoers from other war movies they had made. Gene Tierney played Tina.

Movie critics have often said that this film has not been given as much praise as it deserves. It has received some negative criticism, however. For example, Eric Rhode in his A History of the Cinema from Its Origins to 1970 accuses it of sharing the "sentimental cheeriness" of Going My Way in its treatment of GI's in Italy.

Bibliography

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Bradbury, Malcolm. The Modern American Novel. New York: Oxford University Press, 1984. A helpful summary of twentieth century American fiction, which places A Bell for Adano in the mainstream of conventional realism and naturalism.

Gemme, Francis. John Hersey’s “A Bell for Adano,” “Hiroshima,” and Other Works: A Critical Commentary. New York: Monarch Press, 1966. A brief survey for beginning students. Good cursory treatment of Hersey’s works and an overview of the initial reception of his novels.

Huse, Nancy Lyman. John Hersey and James Agee: A Reference Guide. Boston: G. K. Hall, 1978. Extremely helpful compilation of materials for research. Includes reviews from the time of initial publication.

Sanders, David. John Hersey. New Haven, Conn.: College and University Press, 1967. Excellent overview of Hersey and his work; traces significant themes and beliefs. Good treatment of Hersey’s life, with critical attention to his literary output.

Sanders, David. John Hersey Revisited. Boston: Twayne, 1990. A competent survey of Her-sey’s life and works, updating the previous information on the critical estimate of Hersey and of A Bell for Adano. Also includes bibliography.

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