It was his masterpiece, A Farewell to the Arms, published in 1929, that brought reputation to Hemingway, which reflected the World War I。 His travelling to Africa in the early 1930s provided him with inspiration for his later works like Green Hills of Africa and The Snow of Kilimanjaro。

In 1937, Hemingway headed for Spain to report on the Spanish Civil War。 During this period, he finished a play called The Fifth Column。 Also, his most famous novel which described Spanish’s resistance against the Nazi, For Whom the Bell Tolls, came out, and was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize。 In 1952, his work, The Old Man and the Sea, was published, received good views, and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in the next year。 In 1954, he was conferred the Nobel Prize in Literature。 Shortly, he went to Africa and was almost killed in two successive plane crashes。 In 1959, he bought a house in Ketchum, Idaho, where he committed suicide in the summer of 1961。

For Whom the Bell Tolls is set in the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) which was a prologue of the World War II。 With Germany and Italy Fascist governments directly sending troops to back the rebel Chief Franco, the progressive forces from the whole world made up International Brigade to take part in the protection of Madrid in support of the young Spanish Republic。 

    The novel depicts the brutality of the civil war in a graphical way。 Its publication attracts wide concern and is regarded as one of his representative works。

1。2。 Definition of the Iceberg Principle

    Before becoming a writer, Hemingway was a journalist and focused on the reports on immediate events which required very little interpretation and emphasized on concentration and intensity of focus。 Thus, Hemingway was used to create a spotlight when writing。 This economical writing style, stressing surface elements instead of explicitly delving into underlying themes, left a deep influence on his later writing career。

“If a writer of prose knows enough of what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows and the reader, if the writer is writing truly enough, will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them” (Oliver 322), Hemingway compares his theory about writing to an iceberg in chapter sixteen of Death in the Afternoon。 He believes that, just like the iceberg, only the tip of it can be seen while the knowledge about it is underlying。

According to Hemingway, the facts float above water, while the supporting structure, is out of sight。 That is to say, the deeper meaning of a story should be understood through implicitly rather than revealed by surface elements。