The Things They Carried
In 1990, Tim O'Brien released his second novel about Vietnam, and in the late Sunday edition of the New York Times in March, Robert Harris, editor of The Book Review, reviewed O'Brien's work.
According to Harris, only a few novels have found a way to clarify, with any lasting impression the meaning the war had for the soldiers who served there. He believes that O'Brien's work moves beyond the typical war story filled with fighting and battle and instead spends his time examining courage and fear. Harris believes that this is done with sensitivity and insight and by "questioning the role that imagination plays in helping to form our memories and our own versions of the truth" (1).
The Things They Carried is a collection of interwoven stories, and while it is a work of fiction dealing with the same platoon, Harris believes that it can in no way be considered a novel due to the structure, but rather it is a collection of short stories unified by characters and theme. At the same time, he also believes that while it is not a novel, all of the stories cohere and it is still a worthy piece of fiction.
Harris goes on to say that while there is a lot of gore, as is typical of war stories, O'Brien explains why it was necessary through the voice of the text. Harris quotes from the story "How to Tell a True War Story" which states, "If you do not care for obscenity, you don't care for truth; if you don't care for the truth, watch how you vote. Send guys to war, they come home talking dirty" (2). Without the gore, the emotional ride that O'Brien takes his reader would not have the impact and the reader would not understand the value of the journey O'Brien has taken.
Harris gives several examples of how O'Brien meshes together the physical situations as well as the emotional baggage of the platoon. In the title story, O'Brien juxtaposes the items that soldiers carry: gum, candy, sewing kits, assault rifles, machine guns, grenades. Along with these physical items, the soldiers carry the weight of grief, terror, love and shame.
O'Brien spends the book dissecting courage and cowardice, moving beyond literal descriptions.
This form of writing appeals to the audience’s emotions by making the connection seem more personal, as if O’Brien is speaking directly to each reader. The constant changing of forms of writing within a single novel is unusual, and sometimes they appear to not make sense. O’Brien uses a variety of writing forms in order to make the novel a “true” war story, rather than a novel for purely entertainment purposes. In this chapter the audience is first told of O’Brien’s purpose within the novel: to feel the way he felt. The sometimes confusing and unexpected changes of forms of writing allows the readers to better relate to O’Brien’s own
When the quote says “that part of the story is my own” it must mean O’Brien had taken some true details from personal stories. Could O’Brien taken true information but tried to throw the readers off to keep some privacy for the men the stories were based off? Some of the stories present within the book are completely out of the water. How could O’Brien imagine those ideas up without a base of what actually happened? I believe O’Brien switched the names of the soldiers but kept the stories. If he did the name switching it could emphasize on how the reader could focus on the ideas and situations, not the people. O’Brien would showcase how these situations can affect everyone. Another challenging aspect for me is if the stories are partly true why not honor those written about. Do the soldiers feel shame reading about their failures? O’Brien wrote his novel upon the hopes of helping his PTSD and it could have helped the veterans read and receive help. Along with help the vets it could supply the vets with the honor they
Think that O'Brien is still suffering from what he experienced in Vietnam and he uses his writing to help him deal with his conflicts. In order to deal with war or other traumatic experiences, you sometimes just have to relive the experiences over and over. This is what O'Brien does with his writing; he expresses his emotional truths even if it means he has to change the facts of the literal truth. The literal truth, or some of the things that happen during war, are so horrible that you don't want to believe that it could've actually happened. For instance, "[o]ne colonel wanted the hearts cut out of the dead Vietcong to feed to his dog..
...r because it seems impossible to reconstruct an event from this objective point of view. Maybe the point of telling stories is not trying to recreate the reality of a past event, but it is the message that matters because that might be in the end the only thing that does not necessarily depend on single details of the story, but on the overall picture of an event. That is why to O’Brien another important component of a war story is the fact that a war story will never pin down the definite truth and that is why a true war story “never seems to end” (O’Brien, 425). O’Brien moves the reader from the short and simple statement “This is the truth” to the conclusion that, “In war you lose your sense of the definite, hence your sense of truth itself and therefore it’s safe to say that in a true war story nohting much is ever very true” (O’Brien, 428). These two statements frame the entire irony of the story, from its beginning to its end. Almost like the popular saying “A wise man admits that he knows nothing.”
In the book “The Things They Carried”, O’Brien uses imagery, figurative language and repetition to convey his message. O’Brien’s purpose for story telling, is to clear his conscience of war and to tell the stories of soldiers who were forgotten by society. Many young men were sent to war, despite opposing it. They believed it was “wrong” to be sent to their deaths. Sadly, no one realizes a person’s significance until they die. Only remembering how they lived rather than acknowledging their existence when they were alive.
Another unique aspect to this book is the constant change in point of view. This change in point of view emphasizes the disorder associated with war. At some points during the book, it is a first person point of view, and at other times it changes to an outside third person point of view. In the first chapter of the book, “The Things They Carried,” O’Brien writes, “The things they carried were largely determined by necessity (2).
In the short story, “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien, each soldier carries many items during times of war and strife, but each necessity differs. This short story depicts what each soldier carries mentally, physically, and emotionally on his shoulders as long, fatiguing weeks wain on during the Vietnam War. The author Tim O’Brien is a Vietnam War veteran, an author, the narrator, and a teacher. The main character, First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross is a Vietnam War soldier who is away at war fighting a mind battle about a woman he left behind in New Jersey because he is sick with love while trying to fulfill his duties as a soldier to keep America free. Tim O’Brien depicts in “The Things They Carried” a troubled man who also shoulders the
O’Brien has many characters in his book, some change throughout the book and others +are introduced briefly and change dramatically during their time in war and the transition to back home after the war. The way the characters change emphasises the effect of war on the body and the mind. The things the boys have to do in the act of war and “the things men did or felt they had to do” 24 conflict with their morals burning the meaning of their morals with the duties they to carry out blindly. The war tears away the young’s innocence, “where a boy in a man 's body is forced to become an adult” before he is ready; with abrupt definiteness that no one could even comprehend and to fully recover from that is impossible.
In the Novel The Things They Carried it starts of by talking about the things the men carried physically mentally and emotionally. Throughout the book It gives many examples of how they carry emotional things such as guilt. They tell stories to keep their men alive in memory. It explains how O'Brien has coped with war and why he writes the way he does. Throughout the book they talk about the death of their men and some of the places they were assigned to. It talks about
The novel, “The Things They Carried”, is about the experiences of Tim O’Brian and his fellow platoon members during their time fighting in the Vietnam War. They face much adversity that can only be encountered in the horrors of fighting a war. The men experience death of friends, civilians, enemies and at points loss of their rationale. In turn, the soldiers use a spectrum of methods to cope with the hardships of war, dark humor, daydreaming, and violent actions all allow an escape from the horrors of Vietnam that they experience most days.
The Things They Carried represents a compound documentary novel written by a Vietnam veteran, Tim O'Brien, in whose accounts on the Vietnam war one encounters graphical depictions of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Thus, the stories "Speaking of Courage," "The Man I Killed," "How to Tell a True War Story," "Enemies" and "Friends," "Stockings," and "The Sweetheart of The Song Tra Bong "all encompass various examples of PTSD.
He states that as a soldier, there is so much to soak in from war scenes that it all becomes a muddled mess. Therefore, the story of the moment can be different from each soldier’s perspective due to the parts where each man puts in his own ideas. This leads to some speculation as to whether or not O’Brien’s stories are true or false.
He wants the readers to be able to feel how he felt and understand how everything happened as he tells the story. He wants to provoke the emotional truth. O’Brien tries to prove that imagination is not completely a bad thing and that it is also a good thing. O’Brien starts to create stories about what could have happened and what he could not do at the war, in addition to the original war story. With the power of imagination, O’Brien is able to talk about something that he could have done but did not do in his past.
O’Brien’s unique verisimilitude writing style fills the novel with deep meaning and emotion. Analyzing the novel through a psychological lens only adds to its allure. Understanding why characters act the way they do helps bring this novel to life. The reader begins to empathize with the characters. Every day, the soldiers’ lives hang in the balance. How these soldiers react to life-threatening situations will inspire the reader. Life has an expiration date. Reading about people who are held captive by their minds and who die in the name of war, will inspire the reader to live everyday as if they are currently in the
We have no reason to suppose that science will abate its influence upon trends and outcomes and many reasons to expect that it will continue to shape society's choices and dilemmas. What is unprofitable is to try to outguess the rate of advancing knowledge and the forms and effects of its application through technology. But it is a very different matter to recognize and array the emergent national and global issued confronting humans on this planet and to explore with care the contributions that science could make in managing such issues.