From Here to Eternity

Rating:
Summary: Freedom is an inner Country.
Review: "From here to Eternity" is a many-layered story. There are explicit and implicit levels to read it; in all of them this book is outstanding.

It describes with crude language the life in the Army in times of peace. In this case is the USA's Army just before Pearl Harbor, but the examples shown are universal and may apply to any Army in any country. At this level the class structure of Officers, Noncoms and Privates is shown with penetrating sight. The power relations, the subtle struggle amongst them, loyalties, abuses, solidarity, weakness. All these traits are depicted vividly thru the different characters that come across this epic novel.

At another level is the story of a young man. A Soldier. He is the epitome of soldiership. He knows what is due to the Service and what is due to himself. He sticks to these principles without regard of the cost. Robert Lee Prewitt is a natural fighter; he has enjoyed boxing until an accident on the ring changed him. He will box no more. Destiny puts him in a Company, where the commanding officer is trying to form a crack team in order to win the championship and enhance his career.
Prewitt is subject to increasing pressure to join the team. He won't bend. He will pay the price. He will remain Free in his hearth until the end.

But this is not all. Romance has its place too. Although unconventionally. Prewitt is in love with a prostitute. Sgt. Warden with his boss' wife. Still love is pure and real and touching.
Jones' opus requires the reader to get involved with the story. To cry and laugh with it. To get in touch with the deepest human emotions.
A major experience to be sure!
Reviewed by Max Yofre.

Rating:
Summary: A great Army novel
Review: "From Here to Eternity" is an epic about life in the Army at Schofield Barracks in Oahu, Hawaii, in the months preceding the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. Jones portrays the Army as a system in which enlisted men are like pawns in a political chess game played by the officers. The everyday drudgery of Army life contrasts sharply with the promise of high adventure advertised by the recruiting posters. A common peacetime practice is rewarding soldiers for athletic prowess that has little to do with their military training, and boxing is a popular pastime.

Private Robert E. Lee "Prew" Prewitt, having grown up dirt poor in eastern Kentucky and spent much of his adolescence as a vagrant, does not have many options in life and serves in the Infantry with the intention of being a career soldier. When the novel begins, he has just transferred into G Company where, much to the chagrin of his superior officers First Sergeant Milton Warden and company commander Captain Holmes, he is unwilling to join the boxing team despite the fact that he is a champion welterweight. His superiors try to break him by putting him through systematic psychological intimidation they call "The Treatment." Prew is wise to their motives, but accepts it with cynical indifference.

Meanwhile, Warden is having a clandestine affair with Holmes's wife Karen, whose promiscuity is a rebellion against her imposed domestic lifestyle as an Army wife. Prew also has a love interest, a prostitute named Lorene, who provides sanctuary when he gets into trouble.

The climactic incident of Prew's "treatment" occurs when he gets in a scuffle with a sergeant named Old Ike (who, oddly enough, talks like Yoda). Prew is sentenced to the Stockade, where he must endure swinging a sledgehammer on a rockpile, solitary confinement in the "Hole", and sadistic guards who wield a reign of terror through physical abuse. When one of the guards beats an inmate to death, Prew vows revenge, and making good on it is yet another step in his downward spiral. And here I think it's worth mentioning that Jones writes some of the best fight scenes ever.

What I liked most about "From Here to Eternity" is that, for a military novel, it avoids formulas of jingoism and contrived heroism in order to tell realistic stories about soldiers who are not necessarily honorably dedicated to fighting for their country, and are doing so more out of being in the wrong place at the wrong time than out of patriotism. This is reflected in Prew, who lives for the Army and ultimately is destroyed by it in more ways than one, and the several other disparate characters Jones introduces to emphasize the Army's internal conflicts. And the most indelible memory this novel leaves me is Jones's succinct and brilliant description of a suicide victim's final thoughts in the split second after pulling the trigger of the rifle lodged in his mouth.

Rating:
Summary: A perfect example of why books are called "GREAT".
Review: A truly great book, rich in insight and irony, which juxtaposes the personal against the backdrop of history. Jones took his time to develop so many aspects of character, place, hope, and longing, almost all of which were dashed among the tidal forces of World War 2. This is a book to savor, to read over months, and in the end, to know that it has made your life better in the reading. If character is destiny, then this book speaks volumes about the character and destiny, not just of those in the U.S., but of all mankind--particularly any who have wanted the indefinable.

A masterpiece for the ages.

Rating:
Summary: Modern Library got this one right
Review: Easily one of the top 100 books of the century.

Private Robert E. Lee Prewitt and 1st Sergeant Milton Warden were more interesting than any two characters from any book that I can remember. Each with their own code that occassionally jives with the Army code. Jones has a sharp mind and his characters do much philosophizing. Prewitt spends his time looking for the answers and living up to his own code. He never makes it easy on himself. He always takes the tough way.

Warden, who seems more in control than any character in the book, will occassionaly take a dangerous risk just out of boredom.

An earlier review stated that Prewitt was too smart for his education, but it struck me odd that Warden had read most of the books on Prewitt's "to read" list. Where does a First Sergeant get that much time to read?

The relation between men and women in this book was also quite interesting. As is the relationship between the soldiers themselves.

Give it a look. I'm moving onto The Thin Red Line.

Rating:
Summary: Easily one of the Greatest Books of our Age
Review: FROM HERE TO ETERNITY is an American classic and one of the very best novels about army life before World War II. It is obvious that the author knows his subject and one of the strengths of the book is his ability to describe army life so realistically. The story is also greatly enhanced by some of the most believable and interesting characters you will ever meet in fiction.

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Summary: Epic Storytelling United States Army, 1941.
Review: From Here to Eternity is an awesome and surprisingly touching account of the months leading up to the bombing of Pearl Harbor. James Jones, a veteran of the attack himself, focuses on the individual, rather than the military as a whole. The brilliance of this book lies in the very feature I wanted to disparage, Jones not only adjusts the dialogue for the separate perspectives, but the narrative shifts along with the character. When I felt Jones romanticizing one way of life, but dulling another, it was simply the different characters distinct approach to life. I can't help but see similarities to Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath, Prewitt and Tom Joad are cut from the same cloth, the vilification of Capitalism and the veneration of Socialism, the episodic plot and the interludes of descriptions adoring nature and man.

The book also must have been shocking in its day, candidly addressing homosexuality, prostitution, suicide, torture, masturbation, marital infidelity, and the government's abuse of power. Although I've never seen the movie adaptation, I doubt much of the text made it to the silver screen.

It's interesting Jones's attention centers on each of his characters, but the predominant theme is the military's complete lack of room for the individual, the necessity for the submission of the self to perpetuate the collective, the military machine.

He again touches on the self vs. the collective in Thin Red Line, but the fight is less an internal battle and more of an argument for the building and maintenance of an effective unit.

Jones's trilogy is unparalleled, a must for both civilian and military readers. As a former marine, I only wish we would have had more writers with his talent writing our history.

Also of note: I have read some reviews criticizing Jones's predominantly male characters and military theme which they felt limit his audience, but Karen Holmes is one of the most complex, interesting, and realistic women I have read in fiction in years. She rivals any of the male leads in depth of characterization and seems utterly, yet simply human.




Rating:
Summary: A book much loved. Adolescent innocence contradicted
Review: I have just read a good share of the reviewers of this book on ' Amazon'. They almost without exception speak of it as one of the best, most realistic books that they have ever read.
I remember first reading it many many years ago in high - school. Of course one of the book points of interest for a young person of that age was the ' man- woman stuff' which seemed to me at the time interesting and somehow troubling. In my innocence I thought that the way it works is, that a man and woman fall in love , and they ' do it' and then live happily ever after. I could not quite understand the famous words of Prew ' I love every woman I ever ......'
Along with this part of it another adolescent myth was very much in my mind at the time. A man is tough , and he beats up everybody else , and he is not afraid, and he can really fight and no one can make him afraid. Against this myth which I myself was worried about not measuring up to came the complex reality of Prew standing up to the establishment which wanted to break him. Here too my Innocence was being contradicted. I naturally thought that if people ran the Army then they must be good, and want above all what is good for the Country, and is good for its citizens. All this business about petty- infighting, and people stabbing others in the back for their own interest, also troubled me.
Yet with all the troubling the book at that time did provide a kind of education in worlds I did not know. And it did have very interesting characters and situations . But again much of the behavior in it ( the drunken stuff especially) confused me because it was presented as ' something to be admired' while for me it was alien.
In other words for me in reading the book then there was a lack of sufficient confidence in and awareness of my ' real self' which would have enabled me to simply not be disturbed by ' models of behavior' outside my interest and frame of reference.
And this said I would again point to the virtues of the book, its realistic depiction of the Army world, its capturing of the American mentality and life of its time, its portrayal of interesting individual characters, its celebration of individualism , its awareness of the complexity of human situations, and the impossible conflicts people often are placed in, its awareness of divided loyalties, , its managing to be the best book coming after the Second World War about the Second World War while primarily being about the Army before the War.


Rating:
Summary: Philosophical, absorbing, entertaining
Review: Like "The Thin Red Line," Jones again uses his uncanny ability to transport his readers INTO the characters of his novel. Rather than say, a Tom Clancy book, which is akin to watching a Rambo movie, Jones portrays his fascinating characters in a light that moves the reader, not just describing their actions, but the reasoning and feeling behind those actions.

Jones, unlike any other author I've read, probes the psyche of his protagonists, and as a result, writes some of the most interesting, thought-provoking books that exist.

Not just a look at the US army pre-WW II, this book is a look at the trial of life, the disaffected yet good people that grew out of the Depression, the challenges we've all faced making decisions in life, and the constant challenges a young man faces between compromise and survival in life, and the ability to look at himself in the mirror based on those decisions.

This book clicks on so many different levels, it is difficult to write a succinct review. The depth of insight provided into characters such as Warden, Prew, and the contrast between characters such as, say, Malloy (the classic dreamer/philosopher/socialist from the late '20's) and Lt. Holmes (a philandering officer who has sacrificed his family for career) will leave you thinking about the book and life in those times for days afterwords.

In addition to the philosophical bent of the novel, it is also entertaining, which keeps it moving along, and provides some moments of levity. Stark's (G company's mess sgt.) cleaver rampage comes to mind at the moment.

My only criticism is that the book takes a while to "get into to" - I feel the beginning drags a bit. But you often get out of a book what you put into it, and this one is worth the effort. Definitely recommended, and while you're at it, rid your mind of Terrence Malick's poor film, and pick up "The Thin Red Line" today.

Rating:
Summary: An enduring story; a great tale of Americana
Review: Oddly enough, I first read this novel in the early 1950s when I was a child, and the sweaty barbaric brutality of it scared the wits out of me. No one can deny the sinewy power of this book. The peacetime army of the Schofield Barracks in the late 1930s is gone, of course, but the bitterness and cruelty, the brotherhood and cameradie can be found wherever men work and live together. This novel shows the effect of both Hemingway and Thomas Wolfe (author of LOOK HOMEWARD, ANGEL) on American writing. One of the most impressive features of FROM HERE TO ETERNITY is the way Jones orchestrated his many characters, themes, and plots. He wrote with a masculine, despairing/ecstatic voice that was his alone in American literature. I am very sad that this wonderful novel is currently out-of-print and will probably be forgotten altogether soon, because I've read it 4 times and consider it a part of my life at age 49.

Rating:
Summary: An authentic look at the pre-WW2 US Army.
Review: What can one say about one of the most famous novels of all time dealing with the US Army? This novel is a very authentic look at what a life and career in the pre-WW2 US Army was like. The Army was riven with politics and waiting for a great war to begin. Jones tells an interesting tale of soldiers and officers in the US Army at Pearl Harbor and what their lives were like.

Put simply, the novel tells the story of a company of soldiers at Scofield Barracks, Hawaii shortly before the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. The Army is sleepy, not primed for war. The officers advance by politicking and one of the ways to politick in the peacetime Army was to have one's company do well in the divisional sports competition. The protagonist is a talented boxer who does not want to box. This turns into a test of wills between him and his company commander, who wants another boxing star in his company. There is much more to the story; this is a long and complex novel. The basic theme is that the Army in those days was a small, sleepy institution that would have to be (and was) transformed radically in order to take on the Axis. The novel is an interesting look at the Army as it was in those days.

Jones' writing is excellent and his characterizations are strong. The reader will come to care deeply about the various protagonists. This is a great story. My only criticism is that the book does not feature an uplifting or happy ending, and really, this is something of a dark and unhappy story.