Author Study Response (Books One and Two)

Poet David McCord tells the story of how he once picked up an old copy of St. Nicholas magazine, which printed stories written by children. One of the stories caught his attention, and he was "suddenly struck by a prose passage more earthy and natural in voice than what I had been glancing through. This sounds like E.B. White, I said to myself. Then I looked at the signature: Elwyn Brooks White, age 11." The qualities that led McCord to recognize the young author who would one day write Charlotte’s Web can be summed up in the word "voice."
Roy Peter Clark, "Writing Tool #19: Tune Your Voice," Poynteronline.

As you read each of four works for your author study, your goal is to study the writing as a guide to understanding the writer’s unique voice, which you’ll present to your readers in your final project. For this reason, it is important to read like a detective (analytically and critically). For the first and second books you read, make notes on this guide (you may attach other sheets as necessary) as a starting point in your study of your selected writer’s voice.

My Name Ik-Hwan Kim                     Date 16 February 2007

Title of Book Read: For Whom the Bell Tolls

Published in (year) 1940                 Number of Pages 261

1. Genre (To what category of fiction or nonfiction does it belong? Is it a mystery? Psychological novel? Historical fiction? Young adult? Coming-of-age? Romance? . . . you get the idea)

For Whom the Bell Tolls is another war novel of the Ernest Hemingway. It is a faction that contains historical fact in Civil War of Spain. It is also semi-biographical novel since the Author was involved in the Spanish Civil war, just like "A Farewell to Arms," which was based on the Author’s experience of World War I.

2. Subject (plot if the work is fiction or drama; topic(s) if the work is nonfiction or poetry)

Robert Jordan, an American, take part in Spanish Civil war voluntarily because he was against Fascism and he tries to explode the bridge in the war. During his preparation of the war with Pilar, who has his camp by the rocks near the bridge, he falls in love with Maria. In really short period of time, Robert Jordan falls in deep relationship with Maria, and gets to know about her past which contained many catastrophic moments. Her parents were killed by Fascists and she was abused by them. Explosion was done successfully, but Jordan gets serious injury. Because of the injury, Jordan can’t move freely while the enemies were approaching and Jordan lets Maria leave him. At the end, he gets ready to meet enemies and bravely die with a gun in his hand, hiding behind the tree.

3. Themes or Ideas (themes if the work is fiction, poetry, or drama; ideas if the work is nonfiction)

One theme of this novel is brutality of the war which was also discussed in the previous novel "A Farewell to Arms." By few battles which made many people to die or get injured, Author tries to convey a message about the cruelty of war, and describe it vividly.

Another theme that goes along with death and brutality of the war is love, which is very contrasting idea from the first theme. Love in this novel is also similar to the first novel which had love story during war too. Love between Robert Jordan and Maria, which was so deep that later on Jordan sacrifice himself in the battle field is described in detail that reader can feel it very well.

4. Tone or Author’s Attitude Toward the Material (serious, thoughtful, philosophical, ironic, satirical, sorrowful, angry, bitter, intimate, light-hearted, nostalgic, witty and so on)

Author’s attitude toward the war is bitter. Author first shows this bitterness by describing the horrible situations in war, and cruel and brutal manners of people, so the readers can feel the badness of the war. On the other hand, author shows the bitterness through the contrasting concept, love, by showing the love between characters, and humane quality and natural goodness inside the human. Author shows how brutally these valuable concepts get destroyed in the war.

5. Language (Is it formal or informal? Direct or poetic? Figurative language? Imagery? Allusions?)

Language of this novel is not formal, using a lot of colloquial languages, and terms that used in the wars which is very similar to the first novel. It also contains a lot of imageries, which gives full and deep description about the feelings of the characters, circumstances they are facing, and the behaviors of the characters.

Throughout the novel, the language is direct, although in some parts, author uses poetic or figurative language to give emphasis, and make readers easily get messages that author tries to convey.

6. Point of View (first person or third person omniscient and the like if it’s fiction; stance toward the subject, bias, and the like if it’s nonfiction)

Unlike the first book "A Farewell to Arms," point of view of this novel is third person omniscient. Narrator does not participate in the novel, and tells readers the feelings and thoughts of every character. Readers can easily see the interactions between characters’ thoughts and behaviors.

7. Structure

The entire novel is about a very short period of time, that it is really focused on some particular moments, and lengthens the time of those moments a lot. On the other parts, however, many time periods that author think as not important are shortened or cut off.

Author’s switch of time did an important role in putting emphasis in the novel.

8. Setting (if it’s fiction)

Story is taking place in Spain, while Spanish Civil War.

Protagonist, Jordan, is an antifascist American, who voluntarily takes place in the War, and the other important Character, Maria, is a girl who had traumatic experiences by Fascists in her early age.

9. Characters (protagonist and one or two other major ones if it’s fiction)

Protagonist of the novel is Robert Jordan, an American who voluntarily takes part in the Spanish war because of personal hatred of Fascism. Protagonist in the novel is full of courage, and zealous. He is very humane and warm hearted, as we see by the love between him and Maria, but he can make cold decisions and can be very bold for his lover.

Another Important character is Maria, who loves Robert Jordan. She also has very warm heart, but unlike Jordan, she is very sensitive and follows her sensibility rather than rationality.

10. Conflict (if it’s fiction or memoir)

Protagonist experiences internal conflict when he has to kill many people for the ideology, and hesitates during the war, and think again about the reason why he participated the war voluntarily. Also, when he has to leave Maria, he has internal conflict in making decision to make her leave him.

External conflict is the war between Spanish people that caused a lot of bloody circumstances. Cause of the war, the conflict between ideologies of the society, is also major external conflict that takes part in the book.

11. Intended Audience

Intended Audience of this novel is same as the intended audience of the previous novel "A Farewell to Arms." Author tries to inform people about the war, and ongoing conflict about ideology. Therefore, the intended audience is everybody who does not know about the war well, or have ideological conflict with others.

Vocabulary used in novel is not complex and is rather simple. It uses foreign terms, in Spanish that gives more reality to the novel.

It also contains colloquial terms, and slang, but it is not used abundantly, just enough to put more reality, and not cause unpleasant feelings from those slangs.

13. Pace (Is it a leisurely read? Is it action-packed? Suspenseful?)

Author definitely has put more suspense than the previous novel "A Farewell to Arms," by showing more fear inside the characters, and more battle scenes, but still is not as suspenseful as other war novels, because it contains a lot of thinking processes, and scenes that shows love between characters, that resolves some of the suspense.

"Yes, man, yes," Anselmo said. "We have to kill them and we kill them."