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Summary: The Best Book Ever
Review: The book I read was a pretty good book.Some parts were
bad because it had caqusing i n it.This book was inter esting.
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Summary: War: What Is It Good For?
Review: According to Dalton Trumbo in Johnny Got His Gun: Absolutely nothing.
Only a member of such an infamous and controversial group as the Hollywood Ten could have written such an infamous and controversial novel as Johnny Got His Gun. The book does not rely solely on shock value to produce its effects as countless other controversial novels do; instead, it actually induces brain activity and causes the reader to question his or her views on war, morality, and right and wrong.
Having written over 58 screenplays and novels, one would assume that Dalton Trumbo would be a fairly common household name. In actuality, it is not, which may be partly due to the fact that he was blacklisted in 1950 and spent 11 months in prison, or because he moved to Mexico and wrote 30 scripts under pseudonyms. Whatever the reason may be, Trumbo is not well known. However, Johnny Got His Gun-Trumbo's most popular novel that was first published two days after World War 2 began-deserves to be drilled into the impressionable minds of high schoolers and other such individuals the world over.
A harrowing anti-war novel, Johnny Got His Gun tells the tale of Joe Bonham, an American soldier who drifts in and out of consciousness so repeatedly it's almost indistinguishable whether or not he's hallucinating at any given moment. Frequently throughout the book, the reader and Joe are equally confused with not only themselves but with each other. This allows for an interesting trip, to say the least. An example of a standard scene from the book is Jesus walking through the desert from Tucson and then later perching on top of a speeding locomotive, screaming like a train whistle.
To say the book is well written would be a flagrant lie. There is only one comma in the entire novel; the book is made up of thousands of run-on sentences, amounting to an English professor's nightmare. However, it makes perfect sense why the book is written in this particular style. Thoughts, like the words in Trumbo's novel, flow freely through the stream of consciousness. There often is no distinguishable beginning or end of Joe's train of thought, and the middle usually does not exist. One must become accustomed to this style, or he or she will not be able to get past the first page.
Although understanding the style of the book is hard to overcome, it is well worth the task. Underneath all the run-ons and gibberish is a truthful, enduring message. The book illustrates that war is indeed hell and should be avoided at all costs. It questions the basic values that the majority of Americans possess, such as the love of freedom, patriotism, and the need to defend democracy. Johnny Got His Gun also forces one to look inside oneself; what one finds there might be more hideous than Joe himself.
So what is war good for? Trumbo fiercely defends his opinion in Johnny Got His Gun, and one will find it extremely difficult to disagree.
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Summary: The Rantings of a Communist
Review: This summary contains many spoilers.Joe Bonham is so severely injured in the war that when he wakes up in a hospital bed, he quickly realizes that he has no eyes, ears, nose, mouth, arms, or legs. After figuring out a way to keep track of time and creating his own years and holidays in his mind, and after being awarded a medal of honor for being injured in the war, he tries desperately to communicate to the doctors or nurses in the hospital. This takes until the last sixty or so pages. The bulk of the book is made of author Dalton Trumbo's anti-war rantings and flashbacks to Joe's adolescent years before he was called to fight in the war. After Joe begins tapping his head against the pillow of his hospital bed in Morse code (and being sedated by doctors who think he is crazy), he hears the footsteps of a new nurse one day. She traces the words "Merry Christmas" on his chest and, thirty pages from the end of the book, a doctor figures out what he is trying to say and taps on his forehead "What do you want." Joe taps out a three-paged message about how he could be the rich and famous man with no arms, legs, ears, eyes, nose, or mouth who could communicate to the world about war. The doctor taps that Joe's wishes are against hospital policy and then gives Joe another sedative. The book ends with more of Trumbo's ravings about how you can kill men but you can't destroy their spirit and you can fight a war but the real people who are fighting the war are the ones who are not fighting at all. Although parts of this book were good it would have been better written as an essay. It was clearly written because the author wanted to send the message that war was bad, and the reader understands this message by the third page of the book or so. Also, the style that Dalton Trumbo chose to write this book in is confusing to me. The pages are filled with run-on sentences with lack of punctuation, making the writer look unintelligible. I'm not sure why the author chose to write the book in this style...possibly to show the weakness of Joe's body. This book is not really worth reading if you want to learn something about the war or if you want to read a good fiction book. A better idea of the war would probably be portrayed in a book such as All Quiet on the Western Front.
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Summary: It will change the way you view the world.
Review: Dalton Trumbo's thought-provoking book "Johnny Got His Gun" is the best novel written about war, bar none. The war was no ordinary war. This was a war to make the world safe for democracy. If democracy was safe, nothing else matter-not the dead, not the ruined lives. This is the story of one of those ruined lives. It is graphic, distrurbing, horrible, gruesome, and brutal, much like the war. Dalton Trumbo is one of the most important but least known literary figure of recent times. He wrote more than 60 screenplays including "Exodus," "Papillon," and "Spartacus." "Johnny Got His Gun," a National Book Award Winner, is a masterpiece. It will change the way you view the world.
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Summary: The most powerful and disturbing book I've ever read
Review: This book is undoubtedly one of the most touching, unsparing novels ever written. It blows "All Quiet On the Western Front" out of the water with ease, and that old hat needs to be replaced on high school book lists with this one. After reading Trumbo's horrifying tale of a young man mutilated to the point of being better off dead, those 'strapping young bucks' might think twice about stepping onto the battlefield for any cause whatsoever, even democracy. This book is a hopeless nightmare of sadness and unendurable suffering and I found it gripping to the point of basically reading it cover to cover. If you're a very sensitive person (as am I), you should probably avoid it altogether or at least take it in small doses. There really isn't a glimmer of hope in this book. In the end, although I have to admit that at times I wish I had never touched it, you have to respect Trumbo for having the courage and the talent to write something so courageous and deeply moving. Trumbo forces us to realize that this young man's life is completely and irreparably destroyed, and that we are indeed to blame for it. He makes sure we don't come away from this book psychologically unscathed: we ourselves were complacent enough to allow a senseless, horrific event like the first world war to take place, and the living hell this kid was unwittingly plunged into as a result of his naive trust in the values of country and so called 'honor' is of our own making. He wants to rid of us our illusions about the invulnerability of the young to injury, and attack the ludicrous belief that war is somehow 'honorable' or glorious. It is a senseless massacre that ruins and takes live remorselessly. Maybe after reading this book (or seeing the movie, which in my opinion is equally as gut wrenching, perhaps even more so than the book because we have to watch the suffering rather than just read about it), will give you second thoughts about preaching to your kid the virtues of 'patriotism' or their so called 'duty' to get shipped to another country to be killed or even worse, to be reduced to the level of poor Joe Bonham, an innocent and trusting young man who never knew what him until it was too late.
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Summary: Johnny Got His Gun By Dalton Trumbo
Review: "Johnny Got His Gun is one of the greatest anti-war novels that will wrench your emotions, challenge your values, and open your eyes to the reality of war. Dalton Trumbo is graphic and uncompromising from cover to cover. A must read for anyone who is willing to take the journey."
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Summary: a project begging for the right director
Review: i was extremely moved by this novel.im not sure what led me to read this but i am thoroughly gratefull to whomever recommended it.ive must have read it a zillion times and each time i re-read it ,the emotions are still strong.i then gave in and rented the movie.HUGE DISAPPOINTMENT.very rarely do movies stand up to the book but this was so bad.and to think dalton wrote and directed it!sigh.nevertheless,''johnny got his gun'' is in my opinion the best book on war/anti war ive ever read.was this his only book?
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Summary: DISTURBING
Review: I read this book just before I saw the movie of the same name. It was the first book I read and the first movie I attended, both within a few days after leaving Vietnam in Oct. 1971. I was home on convalesant leave from a military hospital. I probably should have waited a while to see something like this, but it had been recommended to me by other soldiers who, like me belonged to the Vietnam Veterans Against the War. I found the book to be the greatest argument against waging war no matter how justified that had been published up until that time. I would like to see the book as required reading during senior English courses.
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Summary: A Courageous Crippled Character
Review: In the extraordinary novel, Johnny Got His Gun, the author, Dalton Trumbo, reveals the truth about war by illustrating the struggles of a crippled man through the use of stream of consciousness. The story describes a man's journey after he is wounded in battle during WWI. The man, Joe, is a paraplegic who has no arms, no legs, and is deaf, blind and unable to speak. His every day struggles and feelings are revealed to the reader through examples of his past and his inner most thoughts. Dalton's fictional character, Joe Bonham, is exactly what his name states, just a regular "Joe." Before the war he had a girlfriend and a family that loved him. He went to school, had summer jobs, and hung out with friends, then came the war. He and all the other "Joes" had to leave behind the ones they loved and go defend a country that could not defend them. Throughout the novel Joe experiences flashbacks into his past. He recalls a summer when he spent a day performing the most grueling labor of his life. At the end of the day he laid there and felt his body ache in anguish as he said, "There was nothing real but pain." He then awakes from his past only to realize his present condition, to which he refers to himself as a "basket case." Another memory that he described was that of the last night he spent with Kareen, his girlfriend. They both knew that they might never see one another again, so they spent his last remaining hours of his civilian life together. As he awakes from this perfect moment in time he remembers his disable figure, and prays that Kareen or his family would never see him in that state. Dalton uses Joe's thoughts and feelings to paint a picture of perfection and simplicity before the chaos of war. The most evident form of communication throughout the novel is the use of Joe's thoughts, also known as his stream of consciousness. Dalton uses this method to create a character that you can't help but think is real. His wants and desires are the same as every human being, yet he is unable to accomplish them due to his helpless physical condition. In one scene he is lying in his hospital bed and feels the sun shining through the window on his body. He feels a sense of floating. "It's fine Kareen floating here. Lie back more like this like that. Isn't it nice Kareen I love it I love you." This is one of his more pleasant thoughts as compared to the gruesome pictures of pain and fear, shall I mention the rats? I didn't think so. The thoughts of Joe are ones of hope and determination, they leave the reader feeling that if a blind, deaf, and mute cripple can accomplish what he did, the By Golly, so can I! Joe Bohnam may not be a real man, but through reading this novel you realize that there are men in this world just like him. His thoughts are what allow the reader to be able to grasp the true feelings and effects of his character. In conclusion, this book creates a controversial sense of both nationalism and disgust. To know that there are people in our country that are willing to die for a cause and yet some of those very people are injured and left completely incapable of a real life. Trumbo's anti war views are clearly expressed in Johnny Got His Gun. He took a normal guy with a normal life and turned it all upside down to reveal the true effects of war. This intense book will make you cry and it will make you think. Trumbo accomplished his goal with me, I challenge you to read the greatest book that I have ever read and see how it will change your own thoughts.
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Summary: Glory In War? Not after you read this book...
Review: There was a time when war was still noble and ticker tape fell freely on the heads of veterans; our American heroes. There was an era in US history when wars ended with extravagant parades while lovers were reunited after years apart. Dalton Trumbo's chilling novel, Johnny Got His Gun, is about that era--but there are no heroes here. This tale has nothing to do with the romantic homecomings and thrilling American victories. Johnny Got His Gun is about the atrocious reality behind the glitzy Hollywood definition of warfare. Set during World War I, Trumbo's novel tells the story of a brutally injured and disabled man. Isolation has never known such lonliness. The main character, Joe Boeham, describes himself as the "living dead man." He has no arms, no legs, no face, no tongue to speak, no ears to hear, and no eyes to see. This book is the thoughts of Joe Boeham, slipping in and out of time. He describes his past and you can feel the despair in him as he describes his present; his future. The authour's lack of punctuation gives the reader the notion that Joe Boeham has simply a string of thoughts; beginning nowhere and refusing to end. Boeham's goal in life is merely to live. No, not to breathe, not simply to have a steady heartbeat but rather to find in himself some remaining human characteristic. Lying beneath the surface, Dalton Trumbo incorporates Boeham's opinions regarding the draft, warfare in general, and fighting for a word: democracy. A thought provoking, page-turner, Johnny Got His Gun, is not a book you'll soon forget. This is a masterpiece that has touched the masses helping in the struggle to end the glorification of war.
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