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4.18 AVERAGE
4.18 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
challenging
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Book #7 completed for Book Riot Challenge 2019: "A book by a journalist or about journalism"
Holy shit.
This book has given me nightmares, has inspired me with a rage and a hope and an idealism I have the tendency to push away. And it will stick with me for a long time.
Holy shit.
This book has given me nightmares, has inspired me with a rage and a hope and an idealism I have the tendency to push away. And it will stick with me for a long time.
A stark, horrifying portrayal of the accounts of war; no wonder "John Got His Gun" was banned. A novel both dark and unusual for its time. While a bit ambling and sometimes even incoherent, the style adds to the tone and message. Readers who do not have the stomach for its visceral graphics do not have the stomach for war, and should probably re-examine their position on the subject. As a canon of anti-war literature, "Johnny" hits hard emotionally, politically, and morally.
Quite possibly the most gut wrenching novel I have ever read.
Reread after about 8 years...pending review
EDIT: ah, I left it too long, it's not fresh anymore. Anyway this is a classic for a good reason. We have the most limited setting possible here: we spend the duration of the novel in the main character's mind and what remains of his body, with four of five senses extinguished, nowhere to go and nothing to act upon. So we feel trapped, naturally, driven mad by the texture of the hospital bed and the ringing of the remembered telephone. . .but the miracle is that Trumbo liberates the reader at the same time. Liberates Joe -- not only by having him find little scraps of agency (telling time; communicating with his nurses in Morse) but also by revealing the vastness of his mind, his memories, by giving us crazy sequences where Christ Jesus perches on top of the locomotive train taking all the new boys to the trenches and wails "the high, thin music of death". Where the dead--the dead-to-be--the moritari play poker together in purgatory and Joe Bonham gets the cold shoulder, because he's a dead man living.
One of my favorite bits, one of many tender character sketches: "When morning came he stood over their bed holding a breadboard which had two breakfasts on it. 'Here you kids eat.' Tough old Mike standing there gentle and grizzled and fierce with bloodshot painful eyes. Mike had been in jail too many times not to be good. Old Mike who hated everybody."
EDIT: ah, I left it too long, it's not fresh anymore. Anyway this is a classic for a good reason. We have the most limited setting possible here: we spend the duration of the novel in the main character's mind and what remains of his body, with four of five senses extinguished, nowhere to go and nothing to act upon. So we feel trapped, naturally, driven mad by the texture of the hospital bed and the ringing of the remembered telephone. . .but the miracle is that Trumbo liberates the reader at the same time. Liberates Joe -- not only by having him find little scraps of agency (telling time; communicating with his nurses in Morse) but also by revealing the vastness of his mind, his memories, by giving us crazy sequences where Christ Jesus perches on top of the locomotive train taking all the new boys to the trenches and wails "the high, thin music of death". Where the dead--the dead-to-be--the moritari play poker together in purgatory and Joe Bonham gets the cold shoulder, because he's a dead man living.
One of my favorite bits, one of many tender character sketches: "When morning came he stood over their bed holding a breadboard which had two breakfasts on it. 'Here you kids eat.' Tough old Mike standing there gentle and grizzled and fierce with bloodshot painful eyes. Mike had been in jail too many times not to be good. Old Mike who hated everybody."
dark
emotional
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
challenging
dark
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated