Customer Reviews

The Short-timers

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In a note of "Atrocity Exhibition" James Ballard - referring to the act - said that "no kinaesthetic language has yet been devised to describe it in detail, and without one we are in the position of an unqualified observer viewing an operation of brain surgery". "Atrocity" was Ballard's attempt to devise such language. And Gustav Hasford's "The Short Timers" (the basis for Stanley Kubrick's movie "Full Metal Jacket") is much more than a deeply personal portrait a soldier's life in Vietnam: it's the successful effort to give us a prose adequate at describing the world of battle and fear - "like you've really seen beyond". As every great writer, Hasford was a language's creator

Written over a period of seven years (Hasford started collecting notes while he still was a Marine in Vietnam, as combat correspondent for the First Division), "The Short Timers" is divided into three chapters. The first ("The Spirit of the Bayonet") covers Private Joker basic training at the Marine Recruit Centre in Parris Island, circa 1967. This is the part of the movie everyone remembers, ironically thanks to the performance of real life DI Lee Ermey - a guy who reportedly embodied everything Hasford hated - as Sgt. Hartmann, the ultimate drill instructor. While Kubrick approach to the subject was admittedly enthralling, Hasford's original is an object lesson on how to forge words into a butcher's knife. The prose is lucid, almost bitterly simple: Private Pyle's now famous downfall is recorded without even a glint of mercy. Joker (and Hasford) recognise that this is not the "I'm-only-rough-on-'um-because-I-love-'um" cliché of Hollywood movies, but we see that this ritual debasement is working on him as well. More than a simple condemnation of military "dehumanising" this is really a cold-blooded statement on the power of collective, ritualised violence.

It's unfortunate that Kubrick used the rest of this book just loosely. Part two ("Body Count") has Joker serving as a combat correspondent (just as Hasford) in Hue during the Tet Offensive. It's a very complex piece of writing - new readers will be fascinated by the twist and turn of the plot - and the fact that you never lose sight of "what's goin' on" is another demonstration of Hasford's talent. "Body Count" is engineered as a network of images punctuated by Joker's wit, culminating with a bloody head-on assault to the walls of the Citadel (the French-built XVIII century fortress in Hue where the NVA made a stand during the American counteroffensive). At the end of part two, Joker run afoul of some red-tape colonel, is demoted to infantryman and sent to a besieged Khe Shan. While in "Body Count" Joker was the detached observer of disjointed events, in part three ("Grunts") he's back into the heart of the narrative - the story of a patrol in the jungles near the combat base. What happens is simple, straightforward and extremely disturbing - with a denouement much darker that FMJ's end.

"The Short Timers" works very well as a realistic text on the Vietnam War, but Hasford challenges our notion of realism. If (as me) you've never been in Vietnam, never been under fire or never killed anyone - and is symptomatic that all acts of killing in the book aren't conventional "combat" kills - no amount of written (or visual) realism can give you a substitute for the real thing. The first 20 minutes of "Saving Private Ryan" makes for an exciting and a fairly accurate reconstruction, but when the movie was over the audience could get out of the theatre and back into the "normal" world (maybe planning to see the movie again because it was very good). Hasford seems to tell us: reality may look like a motion picture ("Short Timers" includes dozen of references to Hollywood) but there's people that, sometimes, get TRAPPED IN THE MOVIE. For them what you see on TV or read in the books is the real life, and they can't get out of it. They have to live trough it and somehow survive.

This may also hint the reason why Michael Herr's "Dispatches" became much more popular than this far more relevant book. Herr's Vietnam is really the "Lonely Planet Guide to an Asiatic Theatre of War and How To Get the Best Out Of It". It's all flash and excitement and adrenaline - I've at least two friends who travelled recently to Vietnam just because they read "Dispatches" and they wanted to "relive the experience". It's also dated, bleeding of nostalgia for "that" era and "that" place. While, with all its references to the American pop icons like John Wayne, Mickey Mouse or Coke, "The Short Timers" has a timeless, universal quality

Herr was (in Hasford words) a "perceptive tourist", and his book is a book for people that wants the thrill of the ride, but also wants to decide when and where to stop. But for the others, those locked in combat (they can be veterans or parents of kids with a severe, lifelong, disabling disease - a battle isn't always a battle with guns, and fear isn't always fear for your own life), "The Short Timers" speaks the strange and terrible language of an unknown truth, "the truth that civilians don't want to know". To have clearly seen and stated clearly these truths places Gustav Hasford, along with names as Primo Levi, as one of the truly great XX century writers.

I first read this book when I was a Marine ('81-'85). It remained with me then and it remains with me now. I've now read it at least three times and I had forgotten what a wonderfully powerful novel Mr. Hasford crafted. I heard that it took him seven years effort and though it's only a brief 180 pages, it's simple, yet dense. You can read and re-read passages for the pure mastery of the english language Mr. Hasford has so painstakingly done here.

Kubrick's "Full Metal Jacket" is a wonderful film, but reading the "Short-timers," I came away with a different vision. Nowhere is this more true that the recruit training sequence ("The Spirit of the Bayonet") where the training Joker and Cowboy go through is particularly sadistic. I only thank God that my own boot camp experience wasn't anywhere near as harrowing.

One last thing, some reviewers say that the novel's ending is even more bleak than "Full Metal Jacket" and they are right. To tell more would, I think, spoil the book's effect. If you can find this, read it. I got lucky and found a copy for very cheap. If you're a former Marine, don't be surprised if you find many similarities between the Corps of '68 and whenever you served. Don't be further surprised and find yourself rereading it again and again.

I've since found out that Mr. Hasford died in 1993. What a shame. While he has co-authored the screenplay as well as wrote two other novels, none has ever approached "The Short-timers." At least with this masterpiece, he wrote one for the ages.

Get some Mr. Hasford. Ooorah!!!

This must be the best Vietnam War novel I've read. It's a perfect piece of literature. The writing is incredible. Poetic, sharp, and to the point. I've read great things about Stephen Wright's "Meditations in Green" and O'Brien's "Going After Cacciato." I've read both of those books. They're excellent, but neither of them hold a candle to Gustav Hasford's The Short-Timers. The irony being, of course, that this novel is little-known, and not even in print.

Written from the point of view of combat journalist Corporal Joker, the book reads as if it's narrated by one of the Marines Michael Herr followed around in "Dispatches." That same dark sense of humor is in place, that same tone of voice that one moment is expounding on something profound, the next joking about something mundane. Hasford was a vet, he was a Marine in the middle of it all, and his words drip with realism. But there is a surreal aspect to the book as well, as is expected from any Vietnam novel worth its salt. The fate of Rafter Man, as well as the delusional sequence in which Joker believes he's been killed, are macabre bits of surrealism that leave a lasting impression.

The book is spilt into three connected novellas. The first two, "Spirit of the Bayonet" and "Body Count," were adapted by Stanley Kubrick for his film "Full Metal Jacket." However, the final novella in the book, "Grunts," which details Joker's experiences in the besieged Khe Sahn base, rivals the Do Lung Bridge sequence in "Apocalypse Now," and it's a shame Kubrick didn't include this section in his movie.

To increase the impact of the prose, Hasford writes in present-tense. His sentences are lean and mean, making the book a quick read (it's also very short). All of this just makes me scratch my head. Hasford was obviously a talented writer. The novel reminds me of Golding's "Lord of the Flies," not due to content, but due to the quality of writing, a perfect mixture of modicum and depth. So why did Hasford die in obscurity? There's just no justice.

The only recent author I could compare to Hasford would be Thom Jones, who includes several excellent Vietnam short stories in his three collections (i.e., "The Pugilist at Rest," etc). Jones, though, mostly writes character pieces; with Hasford, you not only get that, but also extremely realistic and bloody action sequences. Simply put, he's a great, forgotten author, and his books need to be put back into print, as soon as possible.

This is a very, very good book. But Stanley Kubrick only filmed the first half. So if you want to know the rest of the story ... Be forewarned however; it's pretty bleak, even by the standards of the movie. This is very nearly the best Vietnam novel I have read, although I think its sequel -- "The Phantom Blooper" -- is actually better. Stunning and revelatory are words that come immediately to mind to describe that one. Certain readers might have trouble with the politics of The Phantom Blooper however. Other books of the same calibre as The Short-Timers would be some of the better items in the Avon paperback series from the early '80's. There are about a dozen books or so. I have not read all of them. The best one I know is Tom Suddick's "A Few Good Men". It comes close to Hasford in quality but not quite. The Short-Timers and the other two mentioned above are all experiential (and presumably autobiographical in large part), told from an infantryma! n's perspective. If you would like a little political background for contrast, try to find a copy of "A Tract of Time" by Smith Hempstone, last reprinted in the Avon series.

Probably the best Vietnam war fiction ever written. Gustav Hasford was a Marine Corps combat correspondent and so was I, just in different times. Beyond this connection, I can objectively say that this book is awesome. It grabs you by the gonads and never lets go. The dialogue, the writing, the descriptions, the concepts, all are top-notch and far outrange and overpower anything else I've ever read.

Semper Fi, Gustav!

-- JJ Timmins

For such a short book, this title certainly packs a wallop. In the Nam, you find out where "Rafterman" got his name from as well a few other little details the movie didn't let you in on. The writing is very high school like and juvenile but well worth the read if you're looking for something quick to pass the time. Highly recommend this title.

SHORT-TIMERS is a modern classic a brilliant book fully capturing the experience of Vietnam and how it consumed those it scorched. SHORT-TIMERS is a MUST read for any serious fanatic of any literary weight. This is also the story that served as the template for Stanley Kubrik's Full Metal Jacket, so people familiar with the movie will recognize a great deal of the story and characters from the movie in the novel. Written in vibrant, direct, honest prose, SHORT-TIMERS is a quick and gripping read and captures the taste of the Vietnam experience for the men fighting the war in the mud.

It is an indictment of the contemporary publishing industry that this great book should be out of print! Ranks with John M. DelVecchio's THE 13TH VALLEY as one of the best novels about "the Nam." However, whereas DelVecchio took the inclusive, naturalistic approach (much like THE NAKED AND THE DEAD), Hasford's thin volume is an imagist-impressionist prose poem. I can't recommend it highly enough! If you liked Kubrick's FULL METAL JACKET (based on this book), you'll love the novel!

It's actually really cool to read almost verbatim lines you know from the movie Full Metal Jacket and find them back in the story here. This is one of the better Nam books out there. The dialogue is excellent, but anyone who has seen Full Metal Jacket will recognize it at once. Great Nam book. Definitely overlooked.

For those of us who saw one of Stanley Kubrick's masterpieces about the conflict in Vietnam 'Full Metal Jacket' (the film based on this novel), the details and final outcome are a lot more grim and bloody in the Short-Timers(I am not giving away the ending). I really loved the film, but like most films that are based on pieces of literature, they only tell half the story. The way Gustav Hasford tells his "narrative" is through the cold, cynical eyes of James "Joker" Davis, a Marine "grunt" who was never a grunt by occupation specialty but a journalist. The most telling is the first section called "Spirit of the Bayonet", the process in which a Marine recruit goes through the rituals of becoming a soulless killing machine. The character I had sympathy for was Leonard Pratt (a.k.a Private Gomer Pyle), a recruit who tries hard to do everything right but screws up all the time. As a result, he is often a target by the incredibly tough, sadistic drill instructor Gunnery Sergeant Gerheim (Gunnery Sergeant Hartmann in the film)as well as fellow recruits (including Joker) who often suffer collective punishment for his mistakes. Ironically, "Pvt. Pyle" becomes an excellent, well disciplined Marine, but as result of the abuse internalized he becomes psychotic. I think the point Hasford was trying to convey was that some drill sergeants in the Army or Marines back in the day took combat training to such an extreme degree that it almost results in pure unadulterated hatred for them- hatred to the point of of them almost arranging for their demise at the hands of a recruit.

In the second and third parts, which are called "Body Count" and "Grunts" respectively, Joker (Hasford) takes us through "a world of s--t." The violence and carnage is unmitigated and the author's revelations are uncompromising about the horrors of war. The characters are well developed, each with their own take on the quagmire that was the Vietnam conflict. Each character did his part to protect one another, at the same time though, the atrocities that some of the characters committed in order to survive combat (i.e. taking human war trophies) were well worthy of condemnation. It was early 1968, and the backdrop was the Tet Offensive and the conflict was not getting any better for American G.I.s. Morale was dwindling and so was discipline in all the ranks Readers will find out later how cruelty begets cruelty in combat.

For those of us who have already seen Full Metal Jacket, I suggest you go beyond the film and pick up the Short-Timers, that is if you like to get cerebral and analytical like me on films based on novels. The theme that was both showcased in the Short-Timers and Full Metal Jacket was Gustav Hasford's contempt for the war in Vietnam and the ultimate futility of combat. There is no honor, no glory- just survive the big Green Machine!