“The Capital of the World” by Ernest Hemingway is a story of universal appeal that focuses on personal illusions and disillusions. The title and the opening joke expose the universal nature of the very personal stories that Hemingway tells in his well-crafted narrative.

A Joke

According to the narrator, Madrid is full of boys named Paco (a nickname for Francisco). A popular joke is about a father “who came to Madrid and inserted an advertisement in the personal columns of El Liberal which said: PACO MEET ME AT HOTEL MONTANA NOON TUESDAY ALL IS FORGIVEN PAPA and how the police had to disperse the eight hundred young men who answered the advertisement.”

The everyman nature of the protagonist Paco is clearly defined in these opening lines. The every-civilization designation given Madrid is indicated by the title of the short story.

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