555 - 2013#Program BUBUKalau diminta menyebutkan novel perang favorit, pasti jawabanku sama saja dengan kalau ditanya siapa penulis favorit. Banyak, euy. Kalau novel tema perang, dari rak bukuku di Goodreads sudah bisa kelihatan penulis-penulis mana saja yang jadi favoritku. Nah, untuk posting bareng BBI bulan Agustus 2013, aku memilih novel Alistair MacLean yang ini, buku pertama yang membuatku menjamah genre perang.Tidak jelas alasannya kenapa aku memilih untuk membaca buku yang versi terjemahannya pertama kali diterbitkan Gramedia tahun 1977 ini. Tapi sepertinya sih awalnya cuma coba-coba saja, melebarkan wilayah bacaan, atau mungkin agak bosan membaca cerita detektif dan cerita silat. Sebagai tambahan informasi tidak penting, waktu itu aku masih SMP, masih rajin menyewa buku ke Taman Bacaan Aneka di Jl. Tamansiswa Bandung, dekat Pasar Palasari. Meskipun jauh dari rumah, setidaknya cukup sekali naik angkot dari sekolahku di Kebun Kelapa.Waktu itu, aku tidak tahu siapa Alistair MacLean, belum pernah membaca satu pun bukunya, dan jelas belum ada internet untuk sekedar mencari tahu. Dan kalau dilihat dari gambar sampulnya, rasanya kurang menarik. Iya sih, yang bikin gambar Dwi Koen, dengan ilustrasi semi realistis. Tapi coverboy-nya nggak banget deh, cameo tentara Jermannya apalagi. Sudah gitu, di sampul belakang tidak ada sinopsisnya, cuma endorsement dari surat kabar di Inggris Raya (yang jelas pasti sudah lama banget, berhubung copyright novel ini tahun 1957), yang sama sekali tidak memberikan gambaran tentang apa novel ini sebenarnya:Jalan ceritanya lancar dan mudah diikuti... (Sunday Times)Kekuatan novel ini bersumber dari kelancaran jalan ceritanya, cara si Pengarang mengungkapkan ketegangan dan kemampuannya melukiskan adegan-adegan seru! (Evening Standard)Penuh adegan seru. Penuh ketegangan dari awal sampai akhir. Sebuah problem yang hanya dapat dipecahkan dengan keberanian dan menempuh bahaya... sebuah kisah yang amat mencengkam. (Scotsman)Sebuah cerita bagus yang diceritakan dengan cemerlang -- Kalau Anda membacanya sekali, dengan cepat, Anda akan dapat menikmati ketegangannya. Tetapi kalau Anda membacanya sekali lagi, Anda akan dapat menikmati detailnya yang halus... (Birmingham Post)Petunjuk tentang apa buku ini sebenarnya hanya judul yang mencantumkan "meriam" dan gambar tentara Jerman yang membawa-bawa senapan di sampulnya. Oke deh, karena kata koran-koran Inggris itu buku ini jalan ceritanya lancar dan seru, mungkin patut dicoba untuk dibaca. Dan ternyata... I'm hooked!!! Buku ini menjadi awal dari novel-novel Alistair MacLean lainnya, serta penulis-penulis sejenis, dari Jack Higgins, Frederick Forsyth, sampai Tom Clancy.Jadi, tentang apa buku ini sebenarnya?Pada zaman dahulu kala, di era Perang Dunia II pada tahun 1943, saat kepulauan Yunani dikuasai Jerman, tersebutlah sebuah pulau bernama Navarone. Jerman yang menduduki pulau itu memiliki benteng dengan meriam-meriam yang sulit dihancurkan dan mengancam keselamatan kapal-kapal Inggris yang numpang lewat di perairan Aegea. Inggris berencana menyelamatkan 1200 tentara dari pulau tetangga, tapi khawatir kapal pengangkut akan dibombardir tanpa ampun kalau melewati selat Navarone. Berbagai cara dilakukan untuk menghancurkan meriam benteng Navarone, tapi selalu gagal. Akhirnya dikirimlah tim khusus untuk menyusup ke pulau Navarone dari jalan yang paling berat: tebing yang konon tak bisa dipanjat manusia manapun di selatan pulau. Anggota tim dipilih berdasarkan keahliannya, dan dipimpin oleh Kapten Mallory, yang pada masa damai merupakan pemanjat tebing terulung di Selandia Baru.Waktu yang tersisa untuk menghancurkan meriam laknat itu hanya satu minggu, dan pembaca dipaksa mengikuti setiap jamnya. Dimulai dari saat Kapten Mallory bertemu dengan Kapten Kepala Operasi SOE yang merancang mission impossible itu, berangkatnya tim yang dikumpulkan secara khusus: mulai dari Andrea si mesin perang Yunani, Dusty Miller si ahli bahan peledak dari AS, Casey Brown si ahli mesin, dan Andy Stevens yang juga seorang pendaki gunung, dilanjutkan dengan adegan panjat tebing yang mendebarkan, dan seterusnya.Pada akhirnya, harus diakui endorsemen surat kabar Inggris itu memang benar adanya. Pembaca otomatis tenggelam di dalam cerita, dan kemungkinan tak bisa berhenti membaca sebelum menamatkannya, karena terpompanya adrenalin saat mengikuti misi bunuh diri tim khusus Kapten Mallory. Ya, buatku membaca buku ini seperti menonton film aksi yang asyik.Karenanya... pantas-pantas saja kalau pada tahun 1961 novel ini diangkat menjadi film aksi, yang dibintangi oleh Gregory Peck (sebagai Kapten Mallory), Anthony Quinn (sebagai Andrea) dan David Niven (sebagai Dusty Miller). Film ini termasuk 8 besar box office pada tahun itu, dengan bujet USD 6 juta dan penghasilan kotor nyaris lima kali lipatnya. Untuk ajang award, film ini juga memenangkan Golden Globe untuk kategori film terbaik dan original score terbaik serta memenangkan Academy Award untuk special effect terbaik, selain nominasi untuk kategori-kategori lainnya. Dan kalau diintip di IMDB, ratingnya juga bagus, sekitar 7,6.Pengalaman memuaskan dengan buku ini membuatku akhirnya menjadi salah satu penggemar karya-karya Alistair MacLean, mencari dan membaca buku-bukunya, dari membaca buku-buku terjemahan Gramedia yang jadi favoritku juga (di antaranya The Satan Bug, The Golden Rendezvous, dan Where Eagles Dare), membaca terjemahan non Gramedia (secara umum kecewa dengan terjemahan dan editingnya, karena seringkali boleh dibilang bukan terjemahan melainkan ringkasan!), sampai membaca buku-buku hardcover aslinya kalau belum ada terjemahannya (sengaja jadi anggota Perpustakaan ITB supaya bisa pinjam!). Alistair Stuart MacLean (21 April 1922 - 2 Februari 1987) adalah novelis Skotlandia yang menulis cerita thriller dan petualangan populer. Karyanya yang paling dikenal adalah The Guns of Navarone, Ice Station Zebra, dan Where Eagles Dare, yang juga sukses dalam versi filmnya.
In another cautionary tale about reading something when you're just not in the mood for it, I initially had a bad experience with The Guns Of Navarone. I was in the mood to read it a month ago but decided to wait until I was on vacation to start it. I should've just read it when I felt like it, because when I cracked it open on the plane, I got bored fast and stopped after seventy or so pages (and with a few hours of the flight still to go). I read about a chapter while at the hotel and didn't finish the rest until a few days after I got back. Luckily I was more open to it once I got home and had more fun with the second two-thirds. The other thing that may have stifled some of the joy of the book is my love for the movie, which, after reading the original text, I consider to be superior. It's still a good book, and better than HMS Ulysses, but not as great as MacLean's reputation. The story is the classic men-on-a-mission tale: the Nazis have two enormous guns on a Greek island called Navarone that are halting all Allied progress in the Agean Sea. Captain Mallory (a New Zealander in the book, as opposed to the American of the movie, but just try not picturing Gregory Peck anyway) is charged with putting a team together and infiltrating the island to take out the guns. Along the way, they encounter dangerous terrain, hazardous weather, treachery in their ranks and a whole lot of Nazis. Spoilers...The biggest disappointment for me was the characters. In the movie, they were just much more interesting. There was real conflict between them, whereas here they're all best friends. For example, in the book Andrea would die for Mallory, would follow him into hell; in the movie, he hated Mallory and wanted to kill him. Miller is an easy-going American who pretty much agrees with everything Mallory says, but in the movie he was an uneasy Brit who challenges everything Mallory stood for, who forced Mallory to confront his actions (just as Mallory did for him). There was room for growth and development of the characters in the film, while the novel is content to just let everyone get along. It gets tiring after a while having them do nothing but compliment each other. There's also nothing in particular that makes them come alive. They're all flat, stock characters who have no personalities aside from their nationalities (I did enjoy MacLean's articulation of Miller's American drawl). In the movie, they had different motivations, experiences and outlooks on the war that made them much more human and likeable, even when you got angry with them. I also found it more interesting in the movie that the two Greek resistance fighters who helped them were women. It added a new dynamic to the group. Here it was just two other guys, and they weren't particularly interesting (Panayis was just Andrea-lite). There was, as in the movie, a main Nazi adversary, but he's dispatched here almost as quickly as he's introduced, so the rivalry has no chance to build or, in the end, mean anything. Again, it adds up to a lack of conflict. For what it is, though, it's still an enjoyable read. The pace is quick, the action is well-written, and the tension is kept up throughout. I just wish MacLean had a better handle on the characters, or as good of one as whoever wrote the screenplay for the movie adaptation.
Do You like book The Guns Of Navarone (1984)?
Ahh good ol' Alistair. Guy's a mensch. What a book.He tends to dwell a little to much on a sense of duty and altruism. There's a even a little Batman element where the characters "Don't kill when they don't have to" and often resort to tying Germans up instead of ganking them. I get it. Probably I do anyways. Guy was actually in wars and murdered in the name of King and country so I can see why he doesn't want to perpetuate that. Also he's probably a decent man and seeing how literature makes it easier to create ideal situation for infiltration and espionage where murder can be avoided. Something tells me in their situation a lot more folks would have died. But it was an awesome book.MacLean gets worse and worse as his career progresses. There are a few other authors of similar style, war time, nautical themed authors who I enjoy as well. MacLean is definitely my second favorite. With a bullet. Another guy who I would love to read his entire catalogue just there are too many books and I ain't got time for that. I have very little time for anything. I'm amazed anyone has time to read. I read more than anyone I know other than students and liars. None of my friends read. How do you make time to read? Have you forgone TV? I still watch a few programs but I read so much on the internet it's hard to find time to read. Basically I read for 30 minutes everyday. 2 ten minute intervals on the train to and from work and then at work on break for 10-20 minutes give or take. Lately I've taken to grabbing a 20 minute nap at work. It helps, really. But you have to know how to nap. There's a question for you, Do you know how to nap?I'll leave you with that.
—David
Don't know why, but for the longest time I thought this book was the basis of some spaghetti western that may have featured The Duke or Clint. My pleasant surprise when I read the tale of a group of allied fighters who prove that less is more as they seek to disarm a Nazi island fortress manned by two huge guns that make it impossible for any passing ships to safely rescue the 1200 allied forces trapped on another nearby island--allied forces soon to be wiped out. As I read it, I envisioned a "Great Escape"-like cast in the movie, and it turns out that I wasn't far off, as David Niven, Anthony Quinn and Gregory Peck star in the celluloid version.There is a handful of well-developed characters, each of whom brings his own expertise to this seemingly suicidal mission that took me to a theater of WWII to which I hadn't been much exposed: the Aegean Sea. Though it's fiction, I can well imagine that similar circumstances were not unusual in any number of combat zones, and I appreciated the change of scenery and subsequent geography and meteorological lessons. Alistair MacLean's vivid and fluid narrative took me right there; there's no shortage of page-turning drama as the clock to complete this perilous task quickly winds down with only ticks to spare.While the conclusion was fairly predictable, there was a sufficient number of twists and turns and unforeseen obstacles along the way to keep me perfectly engaged. If it's literary thrills that you seek, "The Guns of Navarone" will not disappoint.
—John Frazier
There are more than a thousand British soldiers trapped on a small island off the Turkish coast, and the Germans are sending a huge force to smash them. The British Navy wants to pull them off, but the only route that can be taken goes right past–the guns of Navarone. Unfortunately neither sea nor air attacks will work on the Navarone fortress due to its unique position, and a mass amphibious assault would take too long. But a small team of specialists might be able to scale the unclimbable cliffs, get past the elite Alpenkorps troops, infiltrate the impenetrable fortress and blow up the invincible guns. Maybe.Perhaps the best known of action writer Alistair MacLean’s books (he also did Where Eagles Dare and Ice Station Zebra), it was made into an Oscar-winning (and notoriously loud) movie in 1961. I was made to feel quite old when the barista at the local coffee shop had never heard of either book or movie.This is a very manly adventure book, full of stiff upper lips and overcoming fear and wishing sadly that one didn’t have to kill quite so many of the enemy. There’s really only one evil German, and even his fellow soldiers don’t approve of his actions.The plan goes wrong almost immediately, and disaster after disaster strikes the team. Mr. MacLean was really good at amplifying the suspense and making the heroes the underdogs of the story. TRIGGER WARNING: The evil German indulges in some torture brieflyThere are some large character changes from the book to the movie (the movie actually has women in it) so even if you’ve seen the film, the book should still have some surprises. Highly recommended.
—Skjam!
