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4.18 AVERAGE
4.18 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
fast-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:
Yes
dark
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Hellish. Absolutely miserable to read, but I could barely put it down.
War is always sad and to come back as only stomach and back of a human must be a very tragic thing. I understand people don't really ever comprehend the damage war does to our men and women. The book has some strong points that are worth discussing and thinking of.
I punched back in from my lunch break but I read the last 10 pages of this book under my desk because I didn't want to put it down.
This message is timeless. The words that Trumbo wrote about a forgotten soldier who must learn to communicate with his darkened world are deafening.
I want to type the last two pages in this space because I feel as though reading the words over and over again is helpful to my own mind....but that seems like redundant plagiarism...so I'll only quote this:
We are men of peace we are men who work and we want no quarrel. But if you destroy our peace if you take away our work if you try to range us one against the other we will know what to do. If you tell us to make the world safe for democracy we will take you seriously and by god and by Christ we will make it so. We will use the guns you force upon us we will use them to defend our very lives and the menace to our lives does not lie on the other side of a nomansland that was set apart without our consent it lies within our own boundaries her and now and we have seen it and we know it.
Put the guns into our hands and we will use them. Give us slogans and we will turn them into realities. Sing the battle hymns and we will take them up where you left off...Make no mistake of it we will live. We will be alive and we will walk and talk and eat and sing and laugh and feel and love and bear our children in tranquillity in security in decency in peace. You plan the wars you masters of men plan the wars and point the way and we will point the gun."
I'm breathless. I'm filled with tears...I'm scared for the world and I am so so glad that i decided to read this book at this moment in time.
This message is timeless. The words that Trumbo wrote about a forgotten soldier who must learn to communicate with his darkened world are deafening.
I want to type the last two pages in this space because I feel as though reading the words over and over again is helpful to my own mind....but that seems like redundant plagiarism...so I'll only quote this:
We are men of peace we are men who work and we want no quarrel. But if you destroy our peace if you take away our work if you try to range us one against the other we will know what to do. If you tell us to make the world safe for democracy we will take you seriously and by god and by Christ we will make it so. We will use the guns you force upon us we will use them to defend our very lives and the menace to our lives does not lie on the other side of a nomansland that was set apart without our consent it lies within our own boundaries her and now and we have seen it and we know it.
Put the guns into our hands and we will use them. Give us slogans and we will turn them into realities. Sing the battle hymns and we will take them up where you left off...Make no mistake of it we will live. We will be alive and we will walk and talk and eat and sing and laugh and feel and love and bear our children in tranquillity in security in decency in peace. You plan the wars you masters of men plan the wars and point the way and we will point the gun."
I'm breathless. I'm filled with tears...I'm scared for the world and I am so so glad that i decided to read this book at this moment in time.
emotional
reflective
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Incredibly moving
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
challenging
dark
emotional
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
challenging
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This has to be one of the most gripping books I've read so far, the other being All Quiet on the Western Front. It made me panicked at times and brought me close to tears quite a lot. I've read it for my "series" of Literature of the First World War, in which I am discussing a piece of literature or art, inspired by or created during the First World War up until the 28th of June, the anniversary of the assassination on Archduke Franz Ferdinand, for many marking the beginning of the First World War.
Dalton Trumbo was born in 1905 and is best known for being one of America's classic scriptwriters. He was responsible for movies such as Spartacus, The Brave One and Roman Holiday. He is also known for becoming a communist and being famously blacklisted during America's Red Scare, which prevented him from working in Los Angeles for a long time. He wrote Johnny Got His Gun after getting inspired by an article about a soldier who lost all of his limbs during the First World War. It also became a leading anti-war novel during the American protests against the Vietnam War.
What I said at the beginning of this review wasn't a joke. This novel literally grips you by the heart and squeezes it. Trumbo's non-standard decision to abandon punctuation makes a huge difference to his writing style and to how you read. Without commas there to make you take a breath, you stumble through sentences, speeding up your reading because you're desperate for the end of the sentence. As a consequence, it is almost exhausting to read this novel because at the end of a paragraph you're almost in a state of panic. Let me explain with an example:
'Oh no.
I can't. I can't stand it. Scream. Move. Shake something Make a noise any noise. I can't stand it. Oh no no no. Please I can't. Please no. Somebody come. Help me. I can't lie here forever like this until maybe years from now I die. I can't. Nobody can. It isn't possible.
I can't breathe but I'm breathing. I'm so scared I can't think but I'm thinking. Oh please please no. No no. It isn't me. Help me. It can't be me. Not me. No no no.
Oh please oh oh please. No no no please no. Please.
Not me.'
This might seem overly dramatic now, when it has been taken out of its context, but when you're reading the novel and you're stuck in poor Joe's mind, this absolutely terrified me. You race through the lines and the hopelessness, helplessness and panic that you find in these words and the endless repetition of 'help' and 'no' really hit home hard.
What makes this novel different from all the other ones I've read so far is that it takes place completely off the battlefield. Although we get flashbacks to all of Joe's life, the action is all in his head, all in the same bed. This allows Trumbo to freely play with all off the human emotions such as love, pain, fear and anger. It also means that rather than showing the consequences of war the way West does in 'The Return of the Soldier', Trumbo takes you through them, one horrifying step at a time. This is also where the reader has to decide whether this is a book for them or not. The absence of punctuation and the constant return to Joe's inner darkness are a strain on your reading and I was unable to read it anywhere were there wasn't complete silence. You have to reread some of the sentences to see whether you actually understood them and then a paragraph on you realize you haven't. You start to wonder about the chronology of his memories, what is real, what is imagined, etc. and by doing this the novel really makes you question the mental strength of humans.
I have always had respect for soldiers because being willing to risk your life so others can live in peace is an incredibly heroic thing to do. After reading this novel, however, I am also scared for and of them. Compare it to how Frodo returns from his "adventures". How does one move on, when in your heart you begin to realize that there is no turning back? The mental strain of warfare must leave wounds that never heal and looking at the current veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan I dare say we still haven't found a way of reintegrating them into our society in such a way that their hurt finds a proper outlet.
It is a horrifying yet necessary read, I believe. Although Trumbo never fought himself and, as a scriptwriter, has a good eye for what sounds dramatic, he does manage to capture the same kind of desperation I have found in the other novels. I recommend it, but only to those willing to power and suffer through.
Dalton Trumbo was born in 1905 and is best known for being one of America's classic scriptwriters. He was responsible for movies such as Spartacus, The Brave One and Roman Holiday. He is also known for becoming a communist and being famously blacklisted during America's Red Scare, which prevented him from working in Los Angeles for a long time. He wrote Johnny Got His Gun after getting inspired by an article about a soldier who lost all of his limbs during the First World War. It also became a leading anti-war novel during the American protests against the Vietnam War.
What I said at the beginning of this review wasn't a joke. This novel literally grips you by the heart and squeezes it. Trumbo's non-standard decision to abandon punctuation makes a huge difference to his writing style and to how you read. Without commas there to make you take a breath, you stumble through sentences, speeding up your reading because you're desperate for the end of the sentence. As a consequence, it is almost exhausting to read this novel because at the end of a paragraph you're almost in a state of panic. Let me explain with an example:
'Oh no.
I can't. I can't stand it. Scream. Move. Shake something Make a noise any noise. I can't stand it. Oh no no no. Please I can't. Please no. Somebody come. Help me. I can't lie here forever like this until maybe years from now I die. I can't. Nobody can. It isn't possible.
I can't breathe but I'm breathing. I'm so scared I can't think but I'm thinking. Oh please please no. No no. It isn't me. Help me. It can't be me. Not me. No no no.
Oh please oh oh please. No no no please no. Please.
Not me.'
This might seem overly dramatic now, when it has been taken out of its context, but when you're reading the novel and you're stuck in poor Joe's mind, this absolutely terrified me. You race through the lines and the hopelessness, helplessness and panic that you find in these words and the endless repetition of 'help' and 'no' really hit home hard.
What makes this novel different from all the other ones I've read so far is that it takes place completely off the battlefield. Although we get flashbacks to all of Joe's life, the action is all in his head, all in the same bed. This allows Trumbo to freely play with all off the human emotions such as love, pain, fear and anger. It also means that rather than showing the consequences of war the way West does in 'The Return of the Soldier', Trumbo takes you through them, one horrifying step at a time. This is also where the reader has to decide whether this is a book for them or not. The absence of punctuation and the constant return to Joe's inner darkness are a strain on your reading and I was unable to read it anywhere were there wasn't complete silence. You have to reread some of the sentences to see whether you actually understood them and then a paragraph on you realize you haven't. You start to wonder about the chronology of his memories, what is real, what is imagined, etc. and by doing this the novel really makes you question the mental strength of humans.
I have always had respect for soldiers because being willing to risk your life so others can live in peace is an incredibly heroic thing to do. After reading this novel, however, I am also scared for and of them. Compare it to how Frodo returns from his "adventures". How does one move on, when in your heart you begin to realize that there is no turning back? The mental strain of warfare must leave wounds that never heal and looking at the current veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan I dare say we still haven't found a way of reintegrating them into our society in such a way that their hurt finds a proper outlet.
It is a horrifying yet necessary read, I believe. Although Trumbo never fought himself and, as a scriptwriter, has a good eye for what sounds dramatic, he does manage to capture the same kind of desperation I have found in the other novels. I recommend it, but only to those willing to power and suffer through.
I came very close to not bothering with this book past the first fifteen pages because of the absence of commas. I truly felt Dalton Trumbo had no idea commas existed whatsoever but after some research I discovered it was intentional. Apparently it’s a literary style called “stream of consciousness”.
Let me tell you, I’m glad I stuck with it because this book really moved me. Joe Bonham is such tragic character who becomes a victim of war and becomes a prisoner in his own mind due to his inability to communicate as a result of an artillery shell exploding in his vicinity resulting in the loss of his arms, legs, ears, eyes, nose, and mouth. Lo and behold, thankfully, he knows Morse code!
Let me tell you, I’m glad I stuck with it because this book really moved me. Joe Bonham is such tragic character who becomes a victim of war and becomes a prisoner in his own mind due to his inability to communicate as a result of an artillery shell exploding in his vicinity resulting in the loss of his arms, legs, ears, eyes, nose, and mouth. Lo and behold, thankfully, he knows Morse code!