Extra Baggage
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien is a novel about a platoon stationed in Vietnam between 1955 to 1975. O’Brien uses his novel to tell his war stories and the war stories of the men he fought with. The novel hold true to it’s title as it repeatedly talks about the baggage carried by the men. Although O’Brien does go into detail of what the men trucked along the trails of Vietnam with them, the physical baggage is not the main focus of the story. The emotional baggage carried by the men makes the novel. The stories range from O’Brien’s life before the war to adapting to war, to life after war, and many more. There is a wide range of stories, but each one of them help create a connection to the author and other characters. When O’Brien was asked during an interview about the meaning of his novel he answered “...I 've never thought of it, really, that way in my heart. Even when I was writing it, it seemed to be a book about storytelling and the burdens we all accumulate through our lives…”(par. 23). NEAL, C. (n.d). 'The Things They Carried, ' 20 Years On. Talk Of The Nation (NPR)
In the beginning of the novel O’Brien talks about all the different objects carried by the men in his platoon. The objects range from person to person. The medic, Rat Kiley, carried medical supplies of
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In the beginning of the novel the main emotional focus is on Jimmy Cross and his feelings for Martha. One day while the boys were checking a tunnel for VC’s, Cross was busy daydreaming about Martha and wasn’t focused on his troop. Lavender was walking back from going to the bathroom and got shot. Point blank in the back of the head. Although it’s a war and people are bound to die, Cross blamed himself and his love for Martha for Lavender’s death. “We paused over a snapshot of Ted Lavender, and after a while Jimmy rubbed his eyes and said he’d never forgive himself for Lavender 's
Within the book The Thing’s They Carried, the stories of the male soldiers and their dealings with the Vietnam War. However he also delves into the stories of the women and how they affected the soldiers and their experiences in Vietnam. While the men dealt with the horrors of war, the women were right at their side, just not in as much of a public view as the male soldiers. O’Brien uses women such as Martha, Linda and Kathleen in The Things They Carried to punctuate how vital rememorance and recompense was to him and other soldiers in Vietnam.
Tim O’Brien is a very gifted author, but he is also a veteran of the Vietnam War and fought with the United States in that controversial war. Tim O’Brien was drafted into the Vietnam War in 1968. He served as an infantryman, and obtained the rank of sergeant and won a Purple Heart after being wounded by shrapnel. He was discharged from the Vietnam War in 1970. I believe that O’Brien’s own images and past experiences he encountered in the Vietnam War gave him inspiration to write the story “The Things They Carried.” O’Brien tells the story in third person narrative form about Lt. Jimmy Cross and his platoon of young American men in the Vietnam War. In “The Things They Carried” we can see differences and similarities between the characters by the things they hold close to them.
In the novel, The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien shares several different experiences during the Vietnam War that had a great impact on the soldiers that fought along side him and himself. Although not all the stories are connected to one another, some intertwine. Attempting to show the reader who he is then and who he is now throughout the book, O’Brien flips back and forth between the past and the present: sharing his experiences during the war and his current time being a post-war father. War takes a toll on a man in more ways than one. Many seek comfort in bringing personal items with them to battle to remember where they came from and what they have to look forward to when returning home.
...ave been. That night Cross “felt shame. He hated himself. He loved Martha more than his men, and as consequence Lavender was now dead.” Cross sobbed that night “he was grieving for Ted Lavender, but mostly it was for Martha, and for himself, because she belonged to another world” he came to the realization that he could no longer think about her because she did not love him the way that he loved her. He also could not continue to put her before the wellbeing of his platoon. So he gave up on her and the idea that they would ever be together.
“The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien is a brutal fiction story that tells about the treacherous adversity a group of men went through during the Vietnam War. The story talks about the brave soldiers
The text reveals that the soldiers have a hard time with the death of ted lavender. For example, they describe ted’s death as if he just ‘’flat fuck fell’’— [The things they carried] The lieutenant cross felt the pain of losing one of his men and he blamed himself for it. One of the characters Kiowa explained how fast it had been. The guy had dropped like so much concrete.’’ Boom – down like cement’’. The lieutenant cross felt the pain of losing one of his men and he blamed himself for it.
Tim O’ Brien alternates between narrative and descriptions of the tangible items that they soldiers carry. He remembers seemingly everything that his squad mates were carrying and provides an “emotionless recitation” of the weights of each of the items the soldiers carried into the field. He frequently uses the term “humping” to describe how the soldiers carry their gear; making them appear more uncivilized, like animals. As he switches back to mentioning the intangible items, such as the experiences of his leader Jimmy Cross and his love Martha, the emotional weights of each soldier is felt by the reader. This contrast in style affirms that they soldiers are human and provides emphasis to the weight these intangible objects have on the soldiers.
Written by author Tim O’Brien after his own experience in Vietnam, “The Things They Carried” is a short story that introduces the reader to the experiences of soldiers away at war. O’Brien uses potent metaphors with a third person narrator to shape each character. In doing so, the reader is able to sympathize with the internal and external struggles the men endure. These symbolic comparisons often give even the smallest details great literary weight, due to their dual meanings. The symbolism in “The Things They Carried” guides the reader through the complex development of characters by establishing their humanity during the inhumane circumstance of war, articulating what the men need for emotional and spiritual survival, and by revealing the character’s psychological burdens.
All the things that he listed were material belongs. “ Among the necessities or near-necessities were P -38 can openers, pocket knives heat tabs, wristwatches, dog tags, mosquito repellent, chewing gum, candy, cigarettes, salt tablets, packets of Kool-Aid, lighters, matches…” (O’Brien 2641). At the time these were the things that the men carried that mattered and how much these things weighed mattered. As the story progressed and the men witnessed more and more of the horrors of war and lost their view of innocence in the world, the important things that they carried with them changed. Especially after Lieutenant Cross’s friend Ted Lavender dies. “Ted Lavender was shot in the head on his way back from peeing. He lay with his mouth open. The teeth were broken. There was a swollen black bruise under his left eye. The cheekbone was gone” (O’Brien 2645). As cross and his men witnessed these atrocities occur, something in them changed, they lost their innocence, their view of the world had shifted. The things that the men carried changed, “ Some things they carried in common… they shared the weight of memory. They took up what others could no longer bear. Often they carried each other, the wounded or weak… They carried the land itself -- Vietnam… all of it, they carried gravity” (O’Brien 2646). As these men lost their innocence in war, they began carrying bigger burdens, they began to carry the weight of
Literary Analysis Essay on The Things They Carried The book The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien is fiction and truth wound together to create a frustrating and addicting novel of fiction about the Vietnam war. O’Brien created stories by using his experiences during the Vietnam whether they are true stories or not is an unattainable knowledge for the reader, the only person of that knowledge is only O 'Brien himself. Through his writing he emphasized the the fact that you cannot perfectly recall the experiences of your past when your telling a story but the way it is told is “true sometime than the happening-truth(O’Brien 171) which helps give The Things They Carried depth beyond that of a “true”, true story. 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.
In the book The Things They Carried Jimmy Cross chang as a charter he started out not caring only wanting to think about Martha and forgetting about war. After ted lavender dies he is determined to become a better Lieutenant for his men. It goes on to talk about the good things in war as well as the bad. The story is an eye opener for many who don't know much about
In The Things They Carried, an engaging novel of war, author Tim O’Brien shares the unique warfare experience of the Alpha Company, an assembly of American military men that set off to fight for their country in the gruesome Vietnam War. Within the novel, the author O’Brien uses the character Tim O’Brien to narrate and remark on his own experience as well as the experiences of his fellow soldiers in the Alpha Company. Throughout the story, O’Brien gives the reader a raw perspective of the Alpha Company’s military life in Vietnam. He sheds light on both the tangible and intangible things a soldier must bear as he trudges along the battlefield in hope for freedom from war and bloodshed. As the narrator, O’Brien displayed a broad imagination, retentive memory, and detailed descriptions of his past as well as present situations. 5. The author successfully uses rhetoric devices such as imagery, personification, and repetition of O’Brien to provoke deep thought and allow the reader to see and understand the burden of the war through the eyes of Tim O’Brien and his soldiers.
Some tangible things they carried with them were remind them of home and provide them with some luck, while others helped keep them alive during the war time. The intangible things the men carried helped the men be carried through the war and survive. Each man carried something different both mentally and physically. Tim O’Brien saw and experienced these men and what they had to go through during this time of war. The chapter “The Things They Carried” shapes each character into who he was during the war and shows us the reality of the Vietnam
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.
In Tim O’Brien’s novel, The Things They Carried, numerous themes are illustrated by the author. Through the portrayal of a number of characters, Tim O’Brien suggests that to adapt to Vietnam is not always more difficult than to revert back to the lives they once knew. Correspondingly the theme of change is omnipresent throughout the novel, specifically in the depiction of numerous characters.