Book Review
The Truman Show

Summary of the plot:
The book is about the television show “The Truman Show”. Truman Burbank, who works in an insurance company, is the main character of this show without knowing it. The producers of the show adopted Truman as he was a baby to document the whole life of a man and show it life on television. To implement this, Christof, the producer of the show, built a whole town, Seahaven, under a giant dome, surrounded by water, the Omnicam Ecosphere Building. Seahaven is Truman’s idyllic little hometown with simulated weather, stars, sun and moon. The dome is built on the Hollywood Hills, above the Hollywood Logo. In this building Truman grows up, from a baby to an adult, daily surrounded by actors, observed by over 5000 hidden cameras. He is called Truman because he is the only non-actor in the show, the only true man. The Show is on air 24 hours a day, mainly financed by Product-Placement, which means the placement of products in films and TV-shows.
But after 29 years Truman becomes mistrustful because several things seem out of place for example a falling spotlight, which represented a star at the nightly sky. After that he discovers many other irregular things, for example he meets the actor of his father, who actually died in a boat accident, representing a homeless.
There are many flashbacks which show earlier moments of the show, which documented Truman’s live nearly complete. In his earlier life were several incidents with people, who wanted to tell Truman about his fictive little world. For example Sylvia, a woman that Truman met as he was at school and still loves, although he married another woman, tried to tell Truman the truth about his life. She was removed from the show by the producer to make sure Truman will never notice that he is in a TV show. They told Truman that she was brought to Fiji. Because of this, Truman’s desire to leave Seahaven grew even stronger. The producers of the show had to try everything to prevent Truman from leaving the dome. For example Truman gets afraid of water as his father seemingly dies in an accident on a sailing tour with Truman, so he doesn’t go in any boat or go over any bridges above water.
Truman slowly discovers more and more irregular facts in his world and tries to break out. Christof integrates Truman’s father again into the show to bring Truman back to normal life. But as Truman discovers that his father did not die in a boat accident his fear of the water disappears so he can finally flee from Seahaven, the town which is only built for Truman, with a stolen sail boat.
Christof, the producer, who lives in his studio in the Moon above Seahaven and watches every turn Truman does, appears at the end as a god-like man, who watches, controls and manipulates Truman. He tells Truman that he only wanted to protect him from the world outside the dome.

Main Characters:

Truman Burbank:

He is the main character of the book. Truman is a normal average guy; always friendly to other people and jokes often. He is married with Meryl but still loves a girl he met in school time, Sylvia, and works in an insurance company. But Truman is still very naive, because in his little world there is no crime and everybody behaves friendly to each other.
His name comes from “true” and “man” because he is the only one in the show, who is not an actor. The name “Burbank” refers to Burbank, California, because many important film production centres are located there, for example Disney and Warner Bros.

Meryl Burbank:

Meryl is Truman’s wife; her true name is Hannah Gill. In the show she is a hysteric, but friendly, nurse. At first, she likes her role, but later, as Truman even hurts her, she wants to give up everything and is leaving the show.
The name “Meryl” comes from the word “merely” that means she is merely an actress and does not have real feelings for Truman. Also her name is a reference to Meryl Streep, an American actress.

Christof:

Christof is the producer of “The Truman Show”. He knows Truman since he was a baby and knows nearly everything about him. It seems that he is cold and has no feelings. But after all, he naturally has a bad conscience because he imprisoned Truman nearly thirty years and finally he is really worried about him.
His name “Christof” comes from Jesus Christ and he’s really like a god in his little universe, because he can manipulate Truman’s whole life.

Sylvia:

Although she is not shown very often, she is very important for Truman’s life. First, the producers planned her to be only an extra. But as Truman visited High School the two fell in love for each other. The producers did not forbid this, because the audience likes love stories.
But later, as she tries to tell Truman the truth about his life, she was removed from the show. She still loves Truman.

The Problem:

The main problem dealt with is the fact that a human, Truman, is caged in a fictive world for his whole life without knowing it. He never had contact to "real" people and never will, so the producer's plan. So if he would leave the Dome some day he would run into problems with other people, because he doesn't have any knowledge of human nature and still is very naive. Also his little fictive world is always friendly to him, there is no crime.
Personal Statement:

I liked the book very much because of the interesting story about a documentation of a whole life. The book is always fascinating because till the end of the book all pieces of information make sense and you slowly understand everything. I also liked the form the book is written in, like a script, so you always have the feeling being in the show. I liked that I understood nearly everything because difficult or special words are explained in English on the bottom of each page, so you don’t have to use a dictionary. As a result I can recommend the book to everyone who likes reading short but fascinating stories - this book only counts 151 pages.