"Let me put it this way: the life of an idiot is no sugar. People laugh at first, then they get annoyed, and they start treating you badly," this is how Forrest Gump, who everyone, of course, remembers from the movie of the same name, begins his story.
Winston Francis Groom Jr. was an American novelist and non-fiction writer, best known for his book Forrest Gump, which was adapted into a film in 1994. Groom was born in Washington, D.C., but grew up in Mobile, Alabama where he attended University Military School (now known as UMS-Wright Preparatory School). He attended the University of Alabama, where he was a member of Delta Tau Delta and the Army ROTC, and graduated in 1965. He served in the Army from 1965 to 1969, including a tour in Vietnam. Groom devoted his time to writing history books about American wars. More recently he had lived in Point Clear, Alabama, and Long Island, New York.
What can I say about this book? The fact that it is written in the person of Forrest himself makes it touchingly naive, then hilariously funny, then pangingly sad... It's funny to read how our hero makes himself lemonade from canned peaches, squeezing them through a sock into a jar. But, on the other hand, the hero's words about the Vietnam War and its casualties, about Lieutenant Dan who lost his legs there, or about Bubba who died... are very impressive.
Forrest's story is almost devoid of emotion, but that only makes it more evocative. Through Gump's "incomprehensible" eyes we see reality only even more vividly and clearly, our objectivity is not limited by the views or emotions of the hero. And what does appear before our eyes?
A faceless, with few exceptions, mass of greedy people, ready to do anything for the sake of a career, success and fame, and it doesn't matter that it will be five minutes long and smelly... (for some reason I remember contemporary Russian television with its "houses"). The author ridiculed everything: the military that started the Vietnam War, presidents and their subordinates, space programs and the system of education, in particular higher education, show business and social movements... But he did it so simply, so naturally, that he was able to avoid moralizing.
Well, in conclusion, I will say that the film does not duplicate the book. There are a lot of episodes in the novel that were not included in the film, and it's probably a good thing that they were not (what seems quite acceptable in the book would have been overdone in the film). But it's a shame I didn't come across my favorite episode of Groom's running across America.
All in all I must say that it's a wonderful book: familiar, likeable characters, an interesting plot and hidden humor made it an interesting read, and the unobtrusive philosophy and peculiarities of Gump's world-view give you a reason to think, which means that the time you spend with the book can't at all be considered a wasted one.
P.S. By the way, Forrest turned out to be not so stupid: among other proofs of the abilities of his mind is the fact that he has read Mr. Dowstowsky's The Idiot.)
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