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For Whom the Bell Tolls Audiobook
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(3.00) - 93,047 listener ratings
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Ernest Hemingway's masterpiece on war, love, loyalty, and honor tells the story of Robert Jordan, an antifascist American fighting in the Spanish Civil War.
In 1937 Ernest Hemingway traveled to Spain to cover the civil war there for the North American Newspaper Alliance. Three years later he completed the greatest novel to emerge from “the good fight,” and one of the foremost classics of war literature in history.
Published in 1940, For Whom the Bell Tolls tells the story of Robert Jordan, a young American in the International Brigades attached to an antifascist guerilla unit in the mountains of Spain. In his portrayal of Jordan’s love for the beautiful Maria and his superb account of El Sordo’s last stand, in his brilliant travesty of La Pasionaria and his unwillingness to believe in blind faith, Hemingway surpasses his achievement in The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms to create a work at once rare and beautiful, strong and brutal, compassionate, moving, and wise.
“If the function of a writer is to reveal reality,” Maxwell Perkins wrote Hemingway after reading the manuscript, “no one ever so completely performed it.” Greater in power, broader in scope, and more intensely emotional than any of the author’s previous works, For Whom the Bell Tolls tells of loyalty and courage, love and defeat, and the tragic death of an ideal. When it was first published, The New York Times called it “a tremendous piece of work,” and it still stands today as one of the best war novels of all time.
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"A fine, fine book. Wish I'd read it ten years ago when I had more of an appetite for books about war. War is daft, war is failure. Hemingway I think makes this pretty clear, especially through the secondary characters and their experinces of the civil war. All the same, and maybe just because it's rough'n'tumble Hemingway, war is glamorised, just a bit, and not least by the hero Robert Jordan, who has a sort of Clint Eastwood persona."
— Tim (5 out of 5 stars)
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“Tremendous…His finest novel.”
— New York Times -
“By turns brutal and compassionate, it is arguably Hemingway’s most mature work and one of the best war novels of the twentieth century.”
— Amazon.com, editorial review
For Whom the Bell Tolls Listener Reviews
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9/4/2021
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Scott, 7/13/2019
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" This may be the only text by Hemingway that I did NOT like... "
— Dorothy, 2/15/2014 -
" This book is like a good meal, but definitely not fast food. It was helpful that I spent a little time (on Wikipedia) learning about the Spanish Civil War. Hemingway was able to give great depth to each character while still holding my interest. The story builds to a suspenseful climax, and a satisfying ending. "
— Bryant, 2/10/2014 -
" Sigh. So I read "Old Man in the Sea" in high school and didn't love it....It took me over a decade to bring myself to read another Hemingway, and so this was it. Ernests second chance. And....I didn't love it. Don't get me wrong, there were moments that were beautiful, I learned something about living in the moment from it, and I cried at the end - actual tears. But overall, I guess I'm just not a Hemingway girl. Good thing he doesn't need me and is a classic author already. "
— Morgan, 2/8/2014 -
" Of course I loved this. The intensity, the obscenity, the present tense. Really hits on the idea of living right now. You can pack a short life into a few number of days. Also, the whole standing up for an idea thing. Tragic of course, and that is why I liked it. "
— Sam, 1/26/2014 -
" This was the first Hemingway I have ever read and I loved it. "
— Lindsay, 1/17/2014 -
" I was a little slow getting into this book but once I got a few chapters in I couldn't put it down. The ending completely shocked me. "
— Sarah, 12/24/2013 -
" How to live a life by a master stylist. And check out what Hemingway says about the "death tax"! "
— Amanda, 11/5/2013 -
" This is the most un-Hemingway Hemingway novel I have ever read. It only proves how versatile a writer papa is. "
— Mark, 10/27/2013 -
" Good book - still not sure what makes it pulitzer prize material (although it was nominated but didn't win but considered Heminway's best work). Some was difficult to read - used "thee" and "thou" throughout didn't really understand why. Desparate love story. Made me want to read more Heminway. "
— Marge, 10/13/2013 -
" Hemingway's meditation on dying well wasn't my favourite of his. I didn't like it nearly as much as A Farewell to Arms, for instance, or even A Moveable Feast. Mind you, for me Hemingway's at his best when he's writing a short story. "
— David, 5/4/2013 -
" this came up in my recommended books and I remembered I have already read it - forever ago but I remember liking it enough but not something I will read again. "
— CJC, 3/20/2013 -
" Written in 1940's about Spain during WWII and the rebels fighting the Fachists. It has more sexual innuendo's than I thought it would for 1940's. Very good and hisotrical. "
— Nancy, 3/2/2013 -
" My favorite Hemingway novel. His best love story. I love his description of the world turning. I have read this novel over and over. "
— Coach, 11/7/2012 -
" Can't get past the "thees" and "thous", especially from Hemingway. This is a no-go for me. "
— Bruce, 8/19/2012 -
" Great book. Did you know Hemingway was such a pompous ass that he stood at a lecturn to write. He had the audacity to put a space between each LETTER and two spaces between each word. I don't know about that guy, he'll be dead someday. "
— Tom, 2/28/2012 -
" The very human, nearly schizophrenic dialogue the main character has inside his own head throughout the book is reason enough to read this beauty. "
— Jessica, 2/21/2012 -
" Better than old man. "
— Colin, 1/7/2012 -
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William Stockwell, 10/20/2011
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" I couldn't bring myself to finish it, so I skimmed the second half of the book. I thought this would be a great introduction to Hemmingway - but I just didn't like it, or the subject, the characters, the pacing. "
— Kristin, 8/6/2011 -
" My all time favorite book. (Ok, along with The Brothers Karamozov.) "
— Courtneyengelstein, 5/23/2011 -
" Es como un viejo amigo. Viva la Republica! "
— Ted, 5/9/2011 -
" Best Hemingway novel I have read. Impossible to describe how good it was. "
— Erring, 5/6/2011 -
" This was definitely a departure from the Hemingway I'm used to from A Farewell to Arms and The Sun Also Rises. I enjoyed it, but it was a bit long in the middle. The beginning and the end were most interesting. "
— Lennis, 4/28/2011 -
" Long and faced paced book even though happening in only 3 days, runs the gamut of emotions despite Robert Jordan's general stoicism "
— Phil, 4/28/2011 -
" I wish that I was good enough to write portions of this book. "
— Peter, 4/25/2011 -
" This is so far my favourite book of all. I think it is exquisite writing. I found that the book moved at an excellent pace, with so much to discuss afterwards. "
— Albert, 4/21/2011 -
" My favorite Hemingway novel. His best love story. I love his description of the world turning. I have read this novel over and over. "
— Coach, 4/20/2011 -
" I had to read this for school, and I enjoyed it more than others we were assigned, but still not one of my favorites. "
— Britney, 4/14/2011 -
" Anything by Hemingway is great and here he's close to his peak. What else can I say? This is one of my favorites of his. "
— Justin, 4/11/2011
About Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961), born in Oak Park, Illinois, started his career as a writer in a newspaper office in Kansas City at the age of seventeen. After the United States entered the First World War, he joined a volunteer ambulance unit in the Italian army. After his return to the United States, he became a reporter for Canadian and American newspapers. During the twenties, Hemingway became a member of the group of expatriate Americans in Paris, which he described in his first important work, The Sun Also Rises. He also wrote Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and The Old Man and the Sea, the story of an old fisherman’s journey, his long and lonely struggle with a fish and the sea, and his victory in defeat. He also wrote short stories that are collected in Men Without Women and The Fifth Column and the First Forty-Nine Stories. Hemingway died in Idaho in 1961.
About Campbell Scott
Campbell Scott has, in addition to his numerous stage and film credits, narrated more than forty audiobooks, including This Boy’s Life and Into Thin Air, and won seven AudioFile Earphones Awards.