Prayer for Owen Meany is the seventh novel by American author John Irving. Published in 1989, he tells the story of John Wheelwright and his friend Owen Meany who grew up together in a small town in New Hampshire during the 1950s and 1960s. According to John's account, Owen is a wonderful child in many ways; he believed himself as God's instrument and set out to fulfill the fate he had prophesied for himself.
This novel is also a tribute to the famous novel GÃÆ'¼nter Grass, The Tin Drum . Grass is a big influence for John Irving, and also a close friend. The main characters of both novels, Owen Meany and Oskar Matzerath, share the same initials as well as some other characteristics, and their story shows some similarities. Irving has confirmed the similarities. Prayer for Owen Meany , however, follows an independent and separate plot.
Video A Prayer for Owen Meany
Ringkasan plot
The story is narrated by John Wheelwright, a former New Hampshire resident who has been a volunteer expatriate from the United States, having settled in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and taking Canadian citizenship.
This story is told in two interrelated time frames. The first time frame is John's present perspective (1987). The second time frame is John's memories of the past: grown in New Hampshire in the 1950s and 1960s with his best friend, Owen Meany.
Today (1987)
The 1987 event is related in the style of a diary entry. John Wheelwright is currently working as an English teacher at Bishop Strachan's private school in Toronto. He was an Anglican, and although he felt strong religious beliefs, he also experienced doubts about Christianity. A virgin and a bachelor, John is fixated on his past life and political conditions in the United States, in particular, the Reagan administration. Today's narrative John emphasizes the re-breaking of past events, commenting and newer anecdotes.
Past
Early Childhood
John Wheelwright and Owen Meany both live in the fictional city of Gravesend, New Hampshire. The children were close friends, despite the fact that John came from a rich, historical family - as the illegitimate son of Tabitha Wheelwright - and Owen was the son of a working granite digger. John Owen's earliest memories involve lifting him up in the air, which is easy because his body is permanently small, to make him speak. A broken larynx causes Owen to speak in a high-pitched voice at all times. During his life, Owen developed the belief that he was "God's instrument".
1950s
When John and Owen moved through their school, it became clear that Owen was progressing in his intelligence and self-consciousness. He expressed his frustration with his parents, who seemed to have complete control, and liked John's mother and grandmother, choosing to spend most of his time at John's house on Front Street. John's mother, Tabitha, eventually married a drama teacher from a local private high school, Dan Needham. Needham won the love of the children by giving them an armadillo doll to play; Owen is primarily taken with the creature, and he and John take turns playing hide and seek with it. Although John likes Needham, he and Owen speculate about who John's biological father might be - Tabitha refuses to tell him.
Owen also likes baseball; despite his bad players, he was curated on a huge collection of baseball cards. At the Little League baseball game, he suddenly gets up to hit and hit the ball, who attacks Tabitha in the head, kills him instantly. John is sad, but he and Owen remain friends after a nonverbal exchange facilitated by Dan Needham. At this point Owen reveals that he feels that he is God's instrument. To reveal this to John, he removed the claws from the filled armadillos, just as God had taken command from his hands. Later, he appeared as a baby Jesus in the production of the Nativity in the Episcopal Church that he and John attended, and as the Christmas Ghost, Will Come in local performances A Christmas Carol . During his last role, he became convinced that he saw his full name and the date of his death at the Scrooge grave. These events reinforce Owen's idea of ​​his relationship with God.
Because John was detained at school, Owen repeated the ninth grade with him so they could attend the Gravesend Academy together. There, Owen Meany earned a reputation as an intelligent and sarcastic student. He was known for his much-voiced editorial column in the school newspaper, where he wrote in all capital letters to reflect his shrill voice; she was also honored with a date with John's cousin, Hester's college age. While Owen helped John with his schoolwork, John assisted Owen in practicing the basketball maneuvers they called "The Shot". It involved John hoisting Owen over his head so he could dip the basketball. Owen did not reveal why they should practice The Shot; it's not legal in any basketball game. However, they keep practicing in motion so they can finish it in less than three seconds.
1960s
Because of the competition with the principal of Gravesend Academy, Owen was expelled in his senior year, wasting his chances to go to Harvard or Yale University, both of whom had offered him a full scholarship. Instead, he chose to attend the University of New Hampshire while undergoing ROTC training so that he would graduate as second lieutenant and take active duty after graduation. This was poorly received by John and Hester, who opposed the Vietnam War. Despite his insistence that he should join his own military, Owen helped John to avoid the draft by cutting off some of his index fingers.
After graduating from university, Owen worked as a casualty officer, carrying the bodies of the Arizona soldiers home from California, recalling his work carving and selling tombstones from his father's quarry. Eventually, Owen told John and Hester that he had dreamed over and over again where he saved many Vietnamese children, but he suffered the wounds that killed him. He believes that this will happen on the date he sees in Scrooge's tomb, and he begins to realize that dream by going to Vietnam. John and Hester were desperate, and tried to convince Owen that it was a dream. However, at this point, the novel blinked over the next few years for Owen's funeral, which confirmed his premature death. At the funeral, Owen's dad reveals to John that he considers Owen "like the Son of Christ", due to the fact that he and Mrs. Meany have never had sexual intercourse. He also told John that he told Owen about a seemingly miraculous conception when Owen was a child. In the flash forward, he also reveals that John has discovered the identity of his father - a man he has known throughout his life. He was frustrated that Rev. Lewis Merrill, the gentle married minister of the Gravesend Congregational Church.
The novel returns to chronological order when John tells about visiting Owen in Arizona as the date of his forecast of death. Owen sends corpses to dysfunctional poor families expressing contempt for the military. Upon waking, John accompanies Owen when he confronts Dick, a nihilistic, rough brother of a dead soldier. Dick expressed a desire to kill Vietnamese people when he showed a deadly weapon smuggled his brother from Vietnam. John and Owen then return to the airport, where Owen almost concludes that his dream was, however, nothing more than a dream, as he had reached the date of his death and he was not in combat. However, a large group of Vietnamese children arrived at the airport, and Owen soon realized the state of his dream. Dick, whom John saw around the airport, tried to kill the children with a grenade. John grabs his gun, and throws it at Owen; together they complete the Shot's maneuver to immediately move the grenades from around the children. The blast hurt Owen. When he died, his voice and his physique calmed the frightened children. He died satisfied that he had fulfilled the will of God.
John is left with memories of his friend, and a strong belief that Owen and his life is a miracle. The last words of his narrative are the fiery pleas: "My God - please bring him back! I'll keep asking you."
Maps A Prayer for Owen Meany
Themes
This novel addresses serious spiritual issues, such as the importance of faith, the issue of social justice, and the concept of destiny, in the context of strange narratives. Throughout the novel, John and Owen both offer criticism of organized religion and religious hypocrisy. However, the spiritual dimension is repeatedly emphasized by Owen's prediction of his impending death. He is quite certain that he will die because he is "God's instrument" and thus will serve some good and important goals. He also believes that he knows the date of his death and that heroic actions on his part will kill him but also save some children. But he is somewhat unclear, about where and how this action will occur.
The narrative is built as a braid of three different tales from John's past, presenting John, and Owen's life. There is a historical narrative of John and Owen's childhood; stories of their adult life (and especially Owen); and the story of John's life after Owen's death. The three streams were united in the fall - Owen's death. Owen always foresaw the way and the importance of his own death.
Irving's familiar arrangement (based on his own biography) of a New England private school links the novel to the framework of his other work. However, the familiar themes and arrangements of Irving (eg, prostitutes, wrestling, and Vienna) do not exist, or just briefly mentioned.
Young Johnny Wheelwright is skeptical of Owen Meany's undoubted belief in the goal of everything. He had a certain reason: that is, his mother's early death (as a result of the impact of Owen's baseball punch), and his mother's failure to reveal her father's identity. John is described as spiritually apathetic as a teenager, but his conclusion brings the spiritual pieces of the story together. Because the novel is written retrospectively, many novels take on the new tone of wisdom John discovers.
John occasionally withdraws from the past to offer a critique of the Vietnam War and the Iran-Contra Affair.
This arrangement is based on Phillips Exeter Academy, in Exeter, New Hampshire. The real John Wheelwright was the founder of the city of Exeter in 1638.
Style
John Irving uses a unique style when writing A Prayer for Owen Meany . Shostak saw Irving's "repetitive groove", seen in some of his novels. He gave two possible reasons for this, writing about the commands brought to a plot, instead of being fucked and clichéd. This repetition is also to emphasize certain key events and ideas. Irving describes his writing process by saying, "I have the last chapters in my mind before I see the first chapters... I usually start with the end, the after feeling, about the dust settling, the epilogue.I love the plot, and how can you composing a novel if you do not know the ending first? "Bernstein also noted that Irving" sought for great novels in very popular tales in the 19th century, sort of... that you do not see much anymore. " Another key feature of this novel style is Irving wrote the Owen dialogue in all capital letters.
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Following the motives of faith, religion, war and friendship, John Irving discusses the background of Prayer for Owen Meany before a group of drama students at Yale University. Irving reveals the "effects of unhealthy Vietnamese generation" on his novel plot. He tried to communicate, "the victims of war, but not the victims you see coming from Vietnam." He also mentions a boy from New Hampshire Hometown, a boy named Russell, who inspired the character of Owen Meany. The protagonist's character with "falsetto stone-dust" became the son of a granite stone quarry that later died in the Vietnam War. Critics also mentioned the similarities in the plot between Irving's novels. Shostak remembers New Hampshire-based stories involving themes such as belief and determination. Irving also added that the "accumulation of his congregation" has affected his writing process.
Publishing history
Prayer for Owen Meany was published by William Morrow and Company in March 1989. The Garp Company owns this copyright. William and Morrow also released an e-book edition on March 13, 2012.
Reception
Prayers for Owen Meany are widely praised and criticized. Alfred Kazin examines John Wheelwright for being a "conscious and unrepentant coward" and calls Owen Meany "a little constipated." However, J. Denny Weaver comments on Owen's "heroic death", and says on the ongoing theme that life is miraculous. Overall, critics find the novel as a different but successful addition to Irving's works. The book is on the New York Times Bestseller List.
According to Simon & amp; Schuster, Prayer for Owen Meany is "the best-selling novel of all time Irving, in every language."
Movies, television and theatrical adaptations
In 1997, the Book-It Repertory Theater of Seattle, created a narrative-style theater adaptation of the fourth chapter of the novel, "The Little Lord Jesus." This adaptation is entitled "Owen Meany Christmas Contest" and has been produced seven times.
The 1998 film Simon Birch, directed by Mark Steven Johnson, is loosely based on the novel. The film stars Ian Michael Smith, Joseph Mazzello, Ashley Judd, Oliver Platt, and Jim Carrey. This eliminates most of the final part of the novel and changes the ending of the story. The film does not have the same title as the book or character name on Irving's request; he feels that it will "mislead the novel readers to see a movie with the same title that is very different from the book."
In 2002, the Royal National Theater held an adaptation of Simon Bent Prayers for Owen Meany: On Faith starring Aidan McArdle as the title character and Richard Hope as John Wheelwright
In 2009, the BBC aired the adaptation of Linda Marshall Griffiths on Pray for Owen Meany starring Henry Goodman, Toby Jones, Charlotte Emmerson, and Max Baldry as Five Star Events at BBC Radio Four.
In 2009, Audible.com produced an audio version of A Prayer for Owen Meany , narrated by Joe Barrett, as part of the Modern Vanguard line of his audiobook.
There are also many theatrical adaptations, including the Freshman Show Association Drama Association of Yale University.
Cultural reference
California punk rock band Lagwagon based the song "Owen Meaney" from their 1998 album Let's Talk About Feelings in the book.
Jimmy Eat World Band also based the song "Goodbye Sky Harbor" from their 1999 album Clarity in the book.
In the movie Milk Money , the elementary school is named Owen Meany Elementary.
Former Los Angeles Lakers coach Phil Jackson has shared this book with his team in the past as part of a ritual commissioning readings for players.
Canadian musician Ryan Granville-Martin writes the instrumental composition entitled "A Prayer for Owen Meany" for its 2013 release of Mouthparts and Wings.
Footnote
External links
- Prayers for Owen Meany on Google Books
- John Irving's official website
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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