Death Be Not Proud

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Summary: Strongly written book.
Review: Death Be Not Proud is a tragic story filled with hope. I read it in one sitting. It is very moving, and carries itself on finely. The medical aspects are very interesting, and generally the book teaches courage and perseverance. The title is appropriate--from the poem. It is altogether a good read.

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Summary: This is one damn sad book.
Review: Wowie flip! Detromental to your hips!

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Summary: A sad but hopeful tale of one family's struggle with cancer.
Review: "Death Be Not Proud" by John Gunther is an extraordinary book. It contains the details of a family's life as they go through the horrors of living with a son with a brain tumor. The son, Johhny, is an exceptionally smart young man. Even as an out patient in his home, he continued to conduct science experiments that were brilliant. He kept a record of his studies and the personal pain that he went through with girls, his cancer, a mistake in a science experiment, and other thoughts that made his life interesting. This boy touched people that had only briefly met him. The story of his life is riveting and will make you sit and read the whole book in one sitting

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Summary: A Review of "Death Be Not Proud"
Review: Adrienne Guidry Mrs. Smith American Lit/6th 14 May 2001

Amazon Book Review

In John Gunther's Death Be Not Proud he gives the detailed fathers point of view of his sons struggle to live. His son Johnny is diagnosed with a brain tumor at the age of sixteen and has a very small chance of living to see his next birthday. While Gunther tries to be objective throughout the book his pain shows through quite often as he depicts the horror and pain that his son had to endure. Gunther mainly centers around his son, and his strong will to live and his study of everything. His son loves to learn, he was constantly, even when very ill diligently working on his schoolwork. He always wanted to know more, and then the more he knew he only wanted to know more. The book is a memoir of his trials during his sons illness. While he and his wife try to be strong for their son, Gunther is adament in stating that his wife was the glue that held the family together. He constantly gives her more credit than anyone in making Johnny's last months peaceful and full of life. The shear audacitie that is shown by Johnny when he is faced by death is amazing to me. I really consider the strength shown by this family to make this book worth reading. Just to see the way this family came together and loved one another in the worst of time is amazing to me. I found it very comforting to know that even though horrible things do happen someone was strong enough to let the rest of the world know that life goes on. The world does not end and the person who is ill can only go to a better place. I think that throughout the book Gunther foreshadows his sons death with the comments he makes. He may not conceal it like some other authors but the message still gets sent loud and clear. You are able to understand that even though you know Johnny will die he will have better days, sooner or later. The only thing that I found disappointing was that even though I knew Johnny would die somewhere in the back of my mind I hoped he would live. Even though I knew he was going to die, it is human nature to wish that someone would live and I die. I am the one that will always wish for a different outcome than the one I know is going to happen and this time is no different. I sincerly thought that maybe they would find some cure for him and for all of the others that suffer from his disease but I was wrong. The book left me feeling alone and with no hope, but then I remebered the strength and persaverance of Frances and it made everything all right. I made me feel better about myself and the world at large who has to suffer with this everyday.Although I was left empty handed so to speak. I felt as though the strength and the courage of John and Frances Gunther were the strength and courage every family would receive while going through such a tough time. The same strength my family and I felt when my father was diagnosed with cancer. You never know where it comes from but miraculously it is there, never fading. Well now you all know how I feel about this book and I wish you all would do the same. I am interested to know how you feel about it and how you feel about the whole subject of brain tumors. Once again I want to salute the parents of Johnny Gunther who through a terrible ordeal remembered every detail and were able to share that with their readers.

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Summary: The Ultimate Battle
Review: John Gunther captivates his audience in this emotional memoir which describes his son's struggle with cancer. Gunther gives the entire world a view of what Johnny Gunther was really like. Johnny is a feisty young man with a hopeful future. He was brighter than almost anyone in recorded history, yet his cancer attacked the one part of his body that he actively used the most - his brain. This is what hurt the Gunther family most, and forced them to question why it was Johnny who was being attacked. John Gunther really does a great job of pulling his readers into the story and making them feel the sorrow and the pride he himself felt for Johnny. Throughout his hardships, Johnny never gives in to the cancer. What makes this book interesting is the fact that from the second page the reader knows Johnny is going to die. This aspect makes reading much more heartfelt because every time you read of Johnny's improvements, deep down you are aware of the inevitable. He really makes the reader feel like they have known Johnny Gunther for years and are just now experiencing his death. This poignant story was not one solely about Johnny, but is an extremely well written account of the struggles many families endure. A definite reccomended read for any family going through the same situation because although it is a sad story, it gives a new air of hope and determination to fight this ultimate battle. John Gunther did a truly outstanding job in writing this memoir about his only son's battle with death.

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Summary: Death Be Not Proud
Review: Death Be Not Proud is one of the most touching and inspiring books ive read [and ive read quite a few books]. what Gunther had gone through is almost unbearable,even to a reader, but mostly the true wonder in this book is how his son [johnny] keeps calm and cheerful in spite of his death nearing him closer every day. This story, although a biography, was more of a fairytale, one that had no beginning and no end. Johnny's spirit would continue to grow inside of others [who have read this book and/or knew him] for a long time to come. This book is a timeless classic, one which hopefully all can enjoy and learn from.

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Summary: A must read
Review: I had vaguely heard of this book when I picked it up at a used bookstore recently for a dollar. It is a thin work, and was tucked in between weightier works of fiction, but the title struck me so I bought it. I read it in a little over one sitting. It is the story of Johnny Gunther, a seventeen year old boy with immense promise and a remarkable spirit, who contracts a brain tumour. The story, written by Johnny's father, is immensely powerful, and despite its incredibly personal (to the author) subject matter, lacking in schmaltz or uncomfortable over-sentimentality. The death of a child is perhaps a parent's greatest fear, and living through this experience with travel-writer John Gunther, his ex-wife Frances, and their amazing son Johnny, is gut-wrenching and painful. Witnessing the end of a life, the unfulfilled promise of a life unlived, a future being dissolved, is heart-rending. Johnny is someone we would all be privileged to know or encounter, and his breathtaking maturity in matters emotional, intellectual and spiritual had me shaking my head in wonder; as the story moved towards its painfilled ending, I felt keenly a sense of the loss this family felt. John Gunther does not relate very much about his own life or hardships, choosing instead to focus on the son, but one is very aware that his marriage has ended and his ex-wife Frances is very much a part of this story also. The former husband and wife were perhaps drawn back together, though not maritally, as a force to deal with their mutual grief in watching their beloved son die before them. More importantly, perhaps, their enthusiasm for their son and his well-being and very survival, probably prolonged his life by many months, as they tried one medical solution after another. I found myself wishing, as the story is unfolding, that something miraculous would happen and Johnny's life would be spared; I almost wish I could be reading his biography written at age 70, had he lived. But perhaps his death, and the dignity with which he carried himself throughout the ordeal made his remarkable (albeit short) life all the more noteworthy, and I hope that people will continue to draw inspiration from this book for many years. It is the type of book that could truly change your life for the better.

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Summary: Classic and Timely
Review: Knowing only that this book was a classic, I purchased it for my middle school son. I read it myself upon learning that it was about a boy who died of an aggressive brain tumor, since my family is struggling with the exact illness in one of our members. I was struck by the absolute tragedy of how this brilliant child was killed by a disease targeting the very source of what made him so unique. Being familiar with the current therapies, I was also somewhat amazed to learn that there has been almost no progress since 1947 in fighting GBM, which remains the fourth largest cancer killer. I found myself questioning his father's decision not to confirm to him that he was going to die, but now it seems to me that Johnny, who should have been living as if he had his whole life ahead of him anyway, was able to do so, and therefore still set goals, and made plans, and achieved more than most of us do whose lives are not cut short. His story is a real triumph of the human spirit.

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Summary: Good but....
Review: I find Mr. Gunther's story of his son's death very moving, but have always thought it just plain wrong that he basically lied to his son. Johnny never knew he was going to die. What might he have wished to do or say that he was never given the chance? As Mr. Gunther points out, Johnny was a fine young MAN. He of all people had the most right to know what was happening to him. He handled death with dignity because he never knew it was coming. I can't help but feel that this may have taken something else away from Johnny in his last days.

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Summary: Death Be Not Proud
Review: John Gunther's only son, Johnny Gunther, died in 1947. Death Be Not Proud is the remarkable and compelling memoir of the death of his son, Johnny Gunther, who suddenly developed a brain tumor at the young age of seventeen. The tumor emerged, seemed to be almost gone, and then suddenly came back and killed him fifteen months later. By the book's title and the first few pages, the reader knows that Johnny will not survive. This makes the story even more tragic as the reader turns every page knowing that even if things are getting better, they are about to go wrong again.
Johnny's brain was possibly the most important thing in his body, as he was a very intelligent person. The subject Johnny loved the most was science; if he had survived he probably would have been able to develop a cure for his very own tumor. He was deciding between two occupations at the time of his sickness: a physicist or a chemist. During the fifteen months of Johnny's illness, he was optimistic about living - the disease hurt his brain, but never his spirit. He went through much pain, but he never complained and kept up with his schoolwork while he was in the hospital or, sometimes, at home. Although he missed his entire senior year at Deerfield because of the tumor, he was allowed to graduate with the rest of his class. As his father wrote, "He died absolutely without fear, and without pain, and without knowing that he was going to die." Unlike most people with a deadly disease, Johnny lived his short life victoriously. Johnny "...did not die like a vegetable. He died like a man, with perfect dignity."
John Gunther writes about his son's struggle with death in a vivid and intriguing way. As the book was written in the late 1940's, the writing is also a little stilted - although it is still very interesting. Part of Gunther's writing style is to use exclamation points at the end of many sentences for emphasis. For example, when he wrote about the early days of Johnny's illness, he used many exclamation points: "That first spinal tap!-the first of many, and spinal taps can be frightening as well as painful. All the other tests!...And the doctors! So many doctors!"
I admire John Gunther for writing this book about his son's death, probably with tears in his eyes during the entire process of writing it. Johnny's parents divorced when he was young, but Gunther still talks about his ex-wife fondly throughout the book. There is also a section written by Johnny's mother at the end of the memoir allowing the reader to view Johnny's struggle against death from both his father and mother's perspective. John Gunther concludes the story by writing in his vivid, lucid style: "I felt his arms, cupping my hands around them, and warmth gradually left them, receding very slowly upward from his hands. For a long time some warmth remained. Then little by little the life-color left his face, his lips became blue, and his hands were cold. What is life? It departs covertly. Like a thief Death took him." The memory of Johnny remains with the reader past the moment of his death. I would recommend this book to all parents who have seen their children suffer, or those who simply enjoy a well-written (although heartbreaking) book.