Johnny Got His Gun
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| Johnny Got His Gun | |
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| Author | Dalton Trumbo |
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| Language | English |
| Publication date | 1939 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| ISBN | ISBN 9780806512815 |
Johnny Got His Gun is an English language didactic antiwar novel written in 1938 (published 1939) by American novelist and screenwriter Dalton Trumbo.[1]
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[edit] Author and context
Dalton Trumbo was born on December 5, 1905 in Montrose, Colorado. Trumbo dropped out of the University of Colorado and joined his family in Los Angeles in 1925. Many of protagonist Joe Bonham's early memories are based on Trumbo's early life in Colorado and Los Angeles. The novel was inspired by an article he read about the Prince of Wales' visit to a Canadian veterans hospital to see a soldier who had lost all of his senses and his limbs. "Though the novel was a pacifist piece published in wartime, it was well reviewed and won an American Booksellers Award in 1940."[2]
[edit] Characters
- Joe Bonham - Joe Bonham is the narrator and protagonist of Johnny Got His Gun. "The novel mainly consists of his reminiscences of childhood and his current struggle to remain sane and, finally, to communicate."[3]
- Regular Day Nurse - "As a caretaker, capable of great humanistic love, the regular day nurse stands apart from the terse medical establishment, represented by the Morse code man, yet is not capable of the perceptive sympathy of the new day nurse."[3]
- Joe's father - Joe's father, Bill Bonham, courted Joe's mother and raised a family with her in Colorado. "His character comes to stand for Joe's nostalgia for an older way of life."[3]
[edit] Plot
Joe Bonham, a young soldier serving in World War I, awakes in a hospital bed after being hit by a mortar shell. He gradually realizes that he has lost all of his mobility and his senses except for touch — his arms, legs, eyes, nose, ears, tongue, both jaws and all of his face have been blown off — but that his mind functions perfectly, leaving him a prisoner in his own body. He tries to die by suffocating himself but he has been given a tracheostomy, which he cannot remove or control. He attempts to communicate with his doctors by banging his head on his pillow in Morse code. His wish is that he may be put in a glass tube and tour the country, to show people the true horrors of war. His wish to die is never granted, however, and it is implied that he will live the rest of his natural life in this condition.
As he drifts between reality and fantasy, he remembers his old life with his family and girlfriend, and reflects upon the myths and realities of war. He also forms a bond, of sorts, with a young nurse who senses his plight.
[edit] Title
The title comes from the phrase "Johnny get your gun"[4], a rallying call that was commonly used to encourage young American men to enlist in the military in the late 19th and early 20th century. That phrase was popularized in the George M. Cohan song "Over There", which was widely recorded in the first year of American involvement in World War I; the versions by Al Jolson, Enrico Caruso and Nora Bayes are believed to have sold the most copies on phonograph records at the time.
[edit] Adaptations
Johnny Got His Gun was adapted into a stage play in 1982, and has since been performed all over the world. It's first, off-Broadway run starred Jeff Daniels. [5]
In 1971, Trumbo directed a film adaptation of the novel, starring Timothy Bottoms as Joe Bonham. The novel was adapted to film again in 2008, starring Benjamin McKenzie.
[edit] References in popular culture
Clips of the 1971 film version were used in the music video for the Metallica song "One". The song itself comes from an idea presented by drummer Lars Ulrich to singer James Hetfield that was very similar to the book. Instead of enduring a long and arduous negotiation for rights to the film, Metallica decided to buy the movie outright, in order to use it in their video.
[edit] Sources and notes
- ^ sparknotes facts
- ^ sparknotes context
- ^ a b c sparknotes analysis
- ^ sparknotes themes
- ^ Johnny Got His Gun the movie
