Student Question
How did Hemingway express "grace under pressure" in For Whom the Bell Tolls?
Quick answer:
Hemingway solidified his code of “grace under pressure” in For Whom the Bell Tolls by creating a protagonist who exemplifies what has become known as the Hemingway Code Hero. The author portrays Robert Jordan as a man who is honorable and courageous in a chaotic world filled with stress and pain. He handles difficult situations by facing death head-on without fear since he does not believe in an afterlife.
By tracing the major novels of Ernest Hemingway, the reader recognizes certain common characteristics of the author’s protagonists in his stories. Hemingway verified in his last interview before his death that some of the qualities of what has become known as the Code Hero include the description of “a man who lives correctly, following the ideals of honor, courage, and endurance in a world that is sometimes chaotic, often stressful, and always painful.”
In For Whom the Bell Tolls, protagonist Robert Jordan exemplifies the Hemingway hero. He is portrayed as an American college professor who volunteers to fight with a group of guerillas against the Fascists during the Spanish Civil War:
The young man, whose name was Robert Jordan, was extremely hungry and he was worried. He was often hungry but he was not usually worried because he did not give any importance to what happened to himself...
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and he knew from experience how simple it was to move behind the enemy lines in all this country ... You had to trust the people you worked with completely or not at all, and you had to make decisions about the trusting. He was not worried about any of that. But there were other things.
The Hemingway Code Hero is identified by the manner in which he handles difficult situations thrust upon him. Since he typically does not believe in an afterlife, he does not fear death. Instead, he faces death with courage. The ritual performed by the hero must include overcoming death as an obstacle. Hemingway believes that since death is inevitable, a man must bravely confront it. The author’s personal belief is that it is not how a person dies that is important, but how one lives. He infuses this principle into his literary protagonists. It is from this code that the concept of “grace under pressure” develops. According to Hemingway, a man must face death with courage or grace. Only by doing so can a man realize his own potential.
Robert Jordan fits the mold of the Code Hero. In the novel, he lives in a fearless pursuit of danger. He defies death at every turn. He possesses a strong work ethic. Even more so than evidenced by protagonists in Hemingway’s other novels, Jordan is active, strong, and decisive. He is self-reliant, and when he believes in a cause, he is willing to die for it.
At the end of the novel, as the enemy combatants approach, the wounded protagonist considers suicide to ease his pain. However, he must complete his mission. He wants to die a brave soldier’s death:
Lieutenant Berrendo, watching the trail, came riding up, his thin face serious and grave. His submachine gun lay across his saddle in the crook of his left arm. Robert Jordan lay behind the tree, holding onto himself very carefully and delicately to keep his hands steady. He was waiting until the officer reached the sunlit place where the first trees of the pine forest joined the green slope of the meadow. He could feel his heart beating against the pine needle floor of the forest.
Jordan’s heroic death comes after the Fascists get closer. He has accomplished his mission. Lying flat on the ground, he readies his gun and courageously dies with grace under pressure in the spirit of the Hemingway code.