Who was James JONES, great underrated writer or hack for movies?

[UTUSN]

They're showing "Some Came Running". I knew *nothing* about him except that they made movies from his books.


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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Jones_(author)

Jones was born and raised in Robinson, Illinois, the son of Ramon and Ada M. (née Blessing) Jones. He enlisted in the United States Army in 1939 and served in the 25th Infantry Division before and during World War II, first in Hawaii at Schofield Barracks on Oahu, then in combat on Guadalcanal, where he was wounded in action.

His wartime experiences inspired some of his most famous works. He witnessed the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, which led to his first published novel, From Here to Eternity. The Thin Red Line reflected his combat experiences on Guadalcanal. His last novel, Whistle, was based on his hospital stay in Memphis, Tennessee, recovering from surgery on an ankle he had reinjured on the island. (see James Jones on Guadalcanal by RJ Blaskiewicz, War Literature and the Arts <1>)

His second published novel, Some Came Running, had its roots in his first attempted novel, which he called They Shall Inherit the Laughter, a thinly disguised autobiographical novel of his experiences in Robinson immediately after World War II. After several rejections for the work being too shrill and lacking perspective, Jones abandoned They Shall Inherit the Laughter and went to work writing From Here to Eternity, which won the National Book Award in 1952 and has been named one of the 100 best novels of the 20th century by the Modern Library. Conversely Some Came Running - albeit made into a critically acclaimed film starring Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and Shirley MacLaine that was nominated for several Oscars - was savaged by the critics, who were especially harsh upon Jones' frequently misspelled words and punctuation errors throughout numerous passages of the book. Actually the critics had not realized that such elements were a conscious style choice by Jones to expound the provinciality of the novel's characters and setting. Jones apparently played around with this style with several short stories written at about the same time as Some Came Running (later incorporated into the collection The Ice-Cream Headache and Other Stories), only to abandon it altogether for the blunt but more grammatically sound style most associated with Jones by the time he finished The Thin Red Line in 1962. ....

The posthumous publication of Whistle in 1978 saw the completion of Jones' war trilogy (the first parts being From Here to Eternity and The Thin Red Line), of which he wrote: "It will say just about everything I have ever had to say, or will ever have to say, on the human condition of war and what it means to us, as against what we claim it means to us."

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[UTUSN]

1. Link to the James JONES Literary Society website

The dupe/EMPTY thread asking for a Delete has gotten more views than this one. And looks like Rachel CARSON was looking forward to the environmentally friendly days of Not Smoking!1 Haha.




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New York City, Jan. 29, 1952. James Jones accepts the National Book Award for From Here to Eternity. His co-winners are poet Marianne Moore (left) and naturalist/writer Rachel Carson (right).
http://www.jamesjonesliterarysociety.org/

JAMES JONES LITERARY SOCIETY

"This is the song of the men who have no place, played by a man who has never had a place, and can therefore play it." --From Here to Eternity (1951)

"...James Jones was not just a good writer but a good man." --Roger Ebert, Review of A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries (See Literary Links section below)

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[Swede]

2. I read the Thin Red Line first,my dad had the book.

I then looked for Jone's other books. They had the ring of truth to them.

[UTUSN]

3. Thanks for that nt/

[Swede]

4. I remember noticing that all the surnames in Thin Red Line were monosyllabic.

Tall,Bell,Gaff etc. My brother also noticed that and told me he'd read that Jones had a reason for that,but damned if I can remember it.

[UTUSN]

5. Wiki sez he used dialect (like twain/CLEMONS) & was escoriated over it n/t