What is the symbolism of "the wall" in the story's title?

In the short story "The Wall" by Jean-Paul Sartre, the titular wall symbolizes death. The story is about a man awaiting his execution at the hands of the fascists in Spain. The story is about awaiting death, as he thinks about his upcoming execution, and this is why it is the title. The prisoner, Ibbieta, awaits his death by firing squad and envisions himself standing in front of the wall in the adjacent courtyard. The prisoner describes the wall in the following passage:

They were going to slap a man up against a wall and shoot at him till he died...

One of his fellow prisoners, Tom, tells Ibbieta,

Someone'll holler "aim!" and I'll see eight rifles looking at me. I'll think how I'd like to get inside the wall, I'll push against it with my back. . . . with every ounce of strength I have, but the wall will stay, like in a nightmare.

The wall has a double meaning in this context. It refers to the actual wall in the courtyard that they expect will be the scene of the firing squad. It also refers to death, no matter how it comes. Tom would like to “push against it…with every ounce of strength [he has], but the wall will stay.” In other words, no matter how Tom or Ibbieta or anyone else fights, death is eventually there at the end, like a solid wall that one cannot get around or overcome.

Ibbieta dreams that “They were dragging me to the wall and I was struggling; I was asking for mercy.” This is another symbol that has a double meaning. On one level, it refers to the wall against which he will stand when he is in front of the firing squad. On another level, it also stands for death. Although he keeps telling himself that he is not frightened, they will have to drag him to his death. Moreover, his body involuntarily reveals his fear. He is perspiring badly, despite the severe cold of the cell.

Before the actual execution, the word "wall" is used twice in connection with the Belgian doctor:

After a minute he let the hand fall inert and went and leaned his back against the wall…

And:

The Belgian pulled away quickly and stumbled back against the wall. For a second he looked at us with horror, he must have suddenly understood that we were not men like him.

While this reference is to the wall of the prison cell, not specifically to the wall in the courtyard, it is also a metaphor for death. The doctor is not sentenced to be executed, yet he stands against the wall, just as the prisoners do. In other words, his time to die will come too.

What is the symbolism of "the wall" in the story's title?

"The Wall" is a short story about a man awaiting execution at the hands of fascist leaders. Because he knows the time and place of his death, he slowly loses the will to live. His captors tell him that he can spare his own life by giving up his friend. He refuses at first, but eventually gives them what he thinks is false information, assuming he has nothing to lose. Ironically however, his friend is found exactly where he said he would be, having left his other location due to an argument. Thus, the main character's life is spared.

The title of this story refers to the wall used by firing squads to execute prisoners. This wall haunts the character throughout the story, reminding him of his impending mortality. The wall itself symbolizes the inevitability and unknowing of one's death. Essentially, everything behind the wall is unknown. Even though the main character thinks he knows what will happen, his story ends in an unexpected twist, at the expense of another's life.

What does the wall symbolize?

It is arguable that "The Wall" in Jean-Paul Sartre's 1930 short story is symbolic in several ways.

As walls are commonly thought to be, it is an obstacle, or a stopping point. In the case of Juan Mirbal and Tom Steinbock, it is the place where their lives will end. They are executed by the falangistas while they are propped in front of the wall. It is both a literal and a metaphorical wall that Tom and Juan have come up against; their protestations are futile, and they are brutally shot to death.

The wall can also be interpreted as symbolizing the line between life and death. When a man is on one side of the wall, he is alive. Once on the other side of the wall, he has ceased to live. Sartre and other existentialist writers and philosophers thought of humankind's situation as the duality of "being" and "nothingness." Because Pablo Ibbieta is thought to have aided the falangistas in their desire to locate Ramon Gris, his existence is preserved. The absurdity of his survival is not lost on Pablo; he laughs because he had tried to protect Ramon Gris by giving the falangistas misinformation about his whereabouts; instead, he sent them directly to Gris. The relationships of events in the story are binary—life/death, truth/deception and being/nothingness—just as there are two sides to the wall.