Johnny Got His Gun cover art

Johnny Got His Gun

 Preview
Try for $0.00
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, and podcasts.
Premium Plus auto-renews for $14.95/mo + applicable taxes after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Johnny Got His Gun

Written by: Dalton Trumbo
Narrated by: William Dufris
Try for $0.00

$14.95 a month after 30 days. Cancel anytime.

Buy Now for $18.92

Buy Now for $18.92

About this listen

 This was no ordinary war. This was a war to make the world safe for democracy. And if democracy was made safe, then nothing else mattered - not the millions of dead bodies, nor the thousands of ruined lives. This is no ordinary novel. This is a novel that never takes the easy way out: it is shocking, violent, terrifying, horrible, uncompromising, brutal, remorseless, and gruesome...but so is war.

Johnny Got His Gun holds a place as one of the classic antiwar novels. First published in 1939, Dalton Trumbo's story of a young American soldier terribly maimed in World War I - he "survives" armless, legless, and faceless, but with his mind intact - was an immediate best seller. This fiercely moving novel was a rallying point for many Americans who came of age during World War II, and it became perhaps the most popular novel of protest during the Vietnam era.

©1991 Dalton Trumbo (P)2008 Tantor Classics Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Literary Fiction War

What the critics say

"[This] is a terrifying book, of an extraordinary emotional intensity." ( The Washington Post)
"There can be no question of the effectiveness of this book." ( The New York Times)
All stars
Most Relevant
The story is narrated so wonderfully that i feel I'm listening to a play. The harsh reality of war and the potential beauty of humanity at peace is so beautifully juxtaposed in this masterpiece. If the world read this wondrrul story by Trumbo (the great who wrote so many famous films such as Roman Holiday), the world might truly be at peace.

Powerful story with an incredible narration

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I echo the other reviews that this audio version is very well done and conveys a richness of the author's message that might be missed by reading the book alone. It's probably doubtful that anyone actually *wants* to read/listen to this book because of the tough content, but I recommend taking the plunge and going for it. I'm really glad I did.

Emotionally taxing but beautiful and important

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
The absolute best narrarator I've ever listened to! This book was meant to be read aloud, it wouldn't have had nearly the same impact if I were to have read it in print.

Incredible!

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
This was so gruesome and terrible and hopeful and... there's just not enough adjectives to describe it. It should be read by all.

The performance is also something to mention. The narrator was perfect for it, and I admittedly cried a couple times.

So hard to read, but for all the right reasons

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Probably the best anti-war book I’ve ever read. Dalton Trumbo did such an amazing job depicting the horror of someone trapped in his own body, with only his thoughts to keep him company. The way he describe Joe’s thought process is so real and relatable, how his thoughts keep jumping from this topic to the next in the exact way our thought process work. It’s fascinating to see it represented so well on paper.

And if the book itself is good, then the audiobook is just phenomenal. William Dufris might be the best narrator I’ve ever heard, hands down. He vocalized Joe’s feeling so well that I felt it was actually Joe reading his thoughts aloud. Bravo, just absolutely fantastic.

Amazing Book with a Phenomenal Narration

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews