Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Johnny Got His Gun, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Horrors of War
The Value of Life
Elites vs. Common People
Time and Memory
Summary
Analysis
Nothing noteworthy happens in Joe’s second year at the hospital, aside from when one of the night nurses trips and sends a vibration through Joe’s bed. In his third year, Joe gets moved to a new room. His new mattress helps him detect vibrations better, making the year go by quickly. His fourth year starts slower as he tries to remember the Bible but only recalls bits and pieces. His difficulty remembering the Bible makes him question whether he hasn’t been keeping time correctly.
Time in this passage moves significantly quicker than it has in most of the previous passages. While the events in Joe’s second, third, and fourth years at the hospital may seem insignificant, they have major implications for Joe. When creating his new calendar, Joe took inspiration from ancient humans. As Joe observes minor events in the hospital around him, he recalls ancient humans watching the sky to learn about the larger universe through astronomy, placing his own experiences within the broader context of the development of human civilization.
Themes
One day, the night nurse changes Joe’s bed linens, even though someone just did it the previous day. This fills Joe with expectation and excitement because this has never happened before—the linens always change every third day. There seems to also be a new day nurse who gives him a bath and takes care that his blankets and mask are all arranged correctly.
Joe has fully adapted to his new life in the hospital, and so now even minor disturbances, like an unexpected changing of bed linens, becomes a major event for him. Previously, Joe expressed frustration that he didn’t pick up any new skills after losing his senses, but this passage shows that he has learned to make better use of his remaining senses—it just took a lot of time for him to achieve proficiency.
Themes
Soon after, Joe feels lots of vibrations and realizes he has visitors. He pictures his mother, his sisters, and Kareen. But his excitement soon fades when he realizes that he doesn’t want anyone he knows to see him in his current condition. He starts rocking around in his bed, until a man’s hand rests on his forehead and calms him. Finally, Joe thinks he knows who the visitors are: they’re doctors, examining him because he must be a very rare and famous case.
Although earlier Joe scoffed at the idea of going to war to defend an abstract concept like “women,” the women from his past remain important to him, even after years in the hospital. Similarly, Joe feels conflicted about the doctors at his hospital—while he wants to make the most of his remaining life, he still regrets how his doctors view him as a success story rather than a cautionary tale about the dangers of war.
Themes
All of a sudden, Joe senses that something important is happening. One of the men pins a heavy thing onto Joe’s chest. He tries to reach for it with his hand and almost feels like he can hold it for a second before he remembers both his arms are gone. He feels a man with a moustache kiss him, and this tells him that he’s in France, since the French kiss soldiers when they hand out medals. Although he supposes the man could also be an American or Englishman who simply used the French custom because Joe has no hands to shake.
Once again, Joe questions traditional ideas about war. While medals traditionally represent a great honor in war, here Joe observes his medal ceremony with mild bemusement, taking a detached tone as he speculates on the nationality of the soldiers in his room. As Joe learns that he may have ended up in France and perhaps even been mistaken for a French soldier, his situation once again highlights how arbitrary the distinctions between countries can be.
Themes
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As Joe thinks about his medal, he gets a little angry, thinking of how generals love to hand out awards but almost never face danger themselves. He feels the vibrations of a voice speaking, which sounds to him like the grunting of a pig. Then it’s quiet, and everyone leaves. Joe hears more vibrations and realizes that maybe vibrations can tell him things about the outside world, like the height, weight, and distance of people in his room. He wonders if he can use vibrations to communicate back.
Pigs commonly symbolize greed and sometimes also ignorance. While the visiting soldier’s voice might literally sound like a pig to Joe (who can only “hear” vibrations), the pig comparison also helps to convey Joe’s disdain for the man. In Joe’s mind, the man pinning a medal on him is a coward, willing to commend others for putting their lives at risk—but not willing to put his own life on the line.
Themes
Joe remembers using Morse code to send messages to Bill Harper on a telegraph machine when he was younger. Using his head on the pillow, he taps out SOS. He tries to tap out other questions too. The door to his room opens, and the old day nurse comes in. Joe gets anxious when he fears the nurse doesn’t understand his tapping. Then, she puts her hand on his forehead. She strokes him while he keeps tapping. He realizes that she’s trying to hold him down to stop the tapping, but he keeps going until he’s exhausted and has to stop.
Communications technology plays a major role in the book: the novel begins with the sound of a telephone, and now Joe achieves an epiphany by considering the telegraph machine. Just like when he was creating his calendar, however, Joe struggles to execute his theories at first. While Joe’s struggle to communicate with the nurse is an extreme example, it captures a universal truth about how people struggle to communicate with others.
Themes
