<P> The book 's title is taken from the metaphysical poet John Donne 's series of meditations and prayers on health , pain , and sickness ( written while Donne was convalescing from a nearly fatal illness ) published in 1624 as Devotions upon Emergent Occasions , specifically Meditation XVII . Hemingway quotes part of the meditation ( using Donne 's original spelling ) in the book 's epigraph , which in turn refers to the practice of funeral tolling : </P>
who wrote the poem for whom the bell tolls
John Donne