For Whom the Bell Tolls: Metaphors 8 key examples

This metaphorical statement about the nature of Maria and Jordan's relationship emerges as an important motif in Chapter 13. Earlier on in the chapter, Jordan uses it to describe their lovemaking:

Suddenly, scaldingly, holdingly all nowhere gone and time absolutely still and they were both there, time having stopped and he felt the earth move out and away from under them.

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The earth did not literally move from the force of Maria and Jordan's love; rather, the statement is an expression of the significance of their relationship. These two people have found solace and comfort in one another, despite all odds, in a wartime scenario inhospitable to life. Their experiences together, though brief, are not insignificant. If anything, the "earth moves" because of the couple's shortened time together. They value the small moments more, for their rarity in the face of near certain death.

Time stops for Jordan, in a manner of speaking, when he is intimate with Maria. The two characters connect on a deep level despite only knowing one another for a short period of time.  Sex with Maria is a "dark passage" leading nowhere because it is not limited by time or space (as the two would like to feel and imagine). They exist in their own world, apart from everyone else and apart from the forward or backwards progression of time. Furthermore, the passage leads to "nowhere" because neither Jordan nor Maria have ulterior motives surrounding their coupling—they simply wish to be intimate, apart from the manipulations and tactics and battle plans that inundate their daily lives.

The above indirect metaphor dwells on the "chastity of mind," relating sex drive and virginity to work drive, discipline, and personal motivation. This metaphor may also connect sexuality to an individual's sense of purpose, or level of idealism with regards to their profession. A "chaste" mind, in this analogy, refers to the mind of a person that has yet to be tainted with disillusionment. Chastity represents a pre-sexual state, one in which the person in question may not even be aware of what sex is. Similarly, Jordan's "chastity of mind" is a pre-experiential, idealized state. 

In this passage, Karkov utilizes figurative language to liken generals and admirals to "treacherous dogs." This entire passage is intended to dehumanize; to position these men as no better than animals, worthy of destruction but not assassination (only humans get assassinated). Karkov does not consider this kind of "disposal" terrorism; because again, such a word would imply that these men share the same level of humanity as Karkov himself and Jordan.

In this passage, Jordan compares war to a wheel, which rotates only to return to where it started. This is a complex commentary on the cyclical, generational nature of war. Facism and violence are not new concepts at the turn of the 20th century—already, entering into the modernist era, societies around the world had seen the cycle of war repeat itself several times over. Modernism simply optimized the wheel, introducing technologies of mass destruction and alliances spanning the entire globe (note Jordan's reference to the wheel having been around "twice," referring to the first and anticipated second world wars).

Interestingly, this description marries both death and life, picturing them as a cycle. Even as the elderly woman has "death" in her face, new "sprouts" come forth from her chin, hairs that signify growth and new beginnings. Hemingway relates Pilar's monologue to themes of death, rebirth, and immortality in For Whom the Bell Tolls: old age and youth coexist at once in the body of a single figurative woman. Time progresses, halts, and regresses, mirroring Jordan's experience of time during these disorienting few days of guerilla warfare.

Maria and Jordan describe the sex act as something that will unite them, make them truly one. They compare themselves, in this united form, to an "animal of the forest." This is apt considering that natural elements (landscape, foliage, wild creatures) operate as a grounding force in For Whom the Bell Tolls. When Jordan feels overwhelmed, disillusioned, and disconnected from reality, he turns to nature, trusting that it will help him feel reconnected to his body. Maria operates similarly. It is fitting, then, that the two would be united as an animal, representative of the very grounding force the lovers have become for one another.

Jordan uses metaphor to compare killing to a sacrament, in the eyes of the Spanish. He compares American killing to Spanish killing, stating that Americans kill "coldly," without personal connection to the act. For the Spanish, Jordan asserts, acts of killing are intimate, personal, like a holy sacrament (i.e., like the blood and body of Jesus that Catholics believe they partake of in the Eucharist). This sacrament is not one of the seven traditional ones (baptism; holy communion; confirmation; reconciliation; anointing of the sick; marriage; and ordination), practiced within the Roman Catholic Church. On the contrary, killing is an additional sacrament, an "extra" one Jordan views as unique to Spanish culture.

This point of view should not entirely be taken at face value. Jordan may be in denial about the bloodthirstiness of Americans; perhaps he cannot cope with the realities of American wartime violence. His metaphor, intended to juxtapose Americans and Spaniards, may instead be a desperate attempt to eschew responsibility for his own role in war.