In the chapter the “Rainy River” of the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, O’Brien conveys a deep moral conflict between fleeing the war to go to Canada versus staying and fighting in a war that he does not support. O’Brien is an educated man, a full time law student at Harvard and a liberal person who sees war as a pointless activity for dimwitted, war hungry men. His status makes him naive to the fact that he will be drafted into the war and thus when he receives his draft notice, he is shocked. Furthermore, his anti-war sentiments are thoroughly projected, and he unravels into a moral dilemma between finding freedom in Canada or standing his ground and fighting. An image of a rainy river marking the border between Minnesota and Canada is representative of this chapter because it reflects O’Brien’s moral division between finding freedom in Canada or standing his ground and fighting in the Vietnam war.
The image of the rainy river displays the rushing waters of
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Yet, he’s split between staying on the bank of his current life or living with the judgement he’ll face from his parents and other people within the town. He describes his thought process using short sentence structure “the word Canada printing itself out in my head… Run, I’d think. Then I’d think, Impossible. Then a second later I’d think, Run” (44). O’Brien follows his instincts to flee but never makes it to Canada, he instead finds himself in the house of a man named Elroy. After some deliberation, he realizes that what it comes down to is “stupidly, was a sense of shame. Hot, stupid shame…” (52). Similarly how the river is a blockade from entering the vast green beauty, judgement from his family and his community develops O’Brien’s feeling of shame and stops him from successfully making that journey to Canada. In turn, he decides to make his way back
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).
Everyday individuals face decisions in which they must choose whether to do what is appealing to them or to choose a more suitable and compliable choice. In the fictional work of ‘The Things They Carried’ by Tim O’ Brien, certain characters such as Tim O’ Brien himself must face decisions similar to these. The novel demonstrates that when an individual is faced with a decision in which there is a choice that he may have to conform, the individual tends to conform due to not wanting to embarrass themselves or to not be portrayed as a coward to others. However when the individual is challenged with these types of decisions, the choice does not matter since the outcome will be what the individual was trying to avoid. That is to say that in the excerpt “The Rainy River” Tim O’ Brien was going through a conflicting decision on whether or not he should go to the war. Yet, as we see it turns out that either choice will lead to either shame or cowardice. If he goes to the war he feels that he will be a coward and that he gave up his own morals and values and accepted something he does not believe in, but if he does not go to war he will be shunned by society and will be labelled as a coward because he will not fight for his country.
The late author and philosopher Dame Iris Murdoch once said “We live in a fantasy world, a world of illusion. The great task in life is to find reality.” The general argument made by Tim O’Brien in his short story “On the Rainy River” is that an individual’s self-perception may skew the line between illusion and reality. More specifically O’Brien argues that the line may be discovered if an individual is able to come to terms with their perception. Illusion and reality are found to be confused throughout the novella “On the Rainy River” as a journey through one’s own mind is taken in order to reach a life-altering decision.
Life can bring unexpected events that individuals might not be prepared to confront. This was the case of O’Brien in the story, “On the Rainy River” from the book The Things They Carried. As an author and character O’Brien describes his experiences about the Vietnam War. In the story, he faces the conflict of whether he should or should not go to war after being drafted. He could not imagine how tough fighting must be, without knowing how to fight, and the reason for such a war. In addition, O’Brien is terrified of the idea of leaving his family, friends and everything he loves behind. He decides to run away from his responsibility with the society. However, a feeling of shame and embarrassment makes him go to war. O’Brien considers himself a coward for doing something he does not agree with; on the other hand, thinking about the outcome of his decision makes him a brave man. Therefore, an individual that considers the consequences of his acts is nobler than a war hero.
When given a chance to become a hero would you take it? Cowardice and courage are main themes in numerous of Tim O’Brien’s stories. “On the Rainy River”, a short story by O’Brien, the author uses a variety of figurative language, follows the conventional mythological structure with a twist, and the theme of cowardice.
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.
As students we are brainwashed by ancient myths such as The Iliad, where war is extolled and the valorous warrior praised. Yet, modern novels such as Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried (THINGS) challenge those very notions. Like The Iliad, THINGS is about war. It is about battles and soldiers, victory and survival, yet the message O'Brien gives us in THINGS runs almost contradictory to the traditional war story. Whereas traditional stories of war take place on battlefields where soldier battles soldier and the mettle of man is tested, O'Brien's battle occurs in the shadowy, private place of a soldier's mind. Like the Vietnam War itself, THINGS forces Americans to question the foundations of their beliefs and values because it calls attention to the inner conscience. More than a war story, O'Brien's The Things They Carried is an expose on personal courage. Gone are the brave and glorious warriors such as those found in the battle of Troy. In THINGS, they are replaced by young men who experience not glory or bravery, but fear, horror, and a personal sense of shame. As mythic courage clashes with the modern's experience of it, a battle is waged in THINGS that isn't confined to the rice-patties, jungles, and shit-fields of Vietnam. Carrying more than the typical soldier's wares, O'Brien's narrator is armed with an arsenal of feelings and words that slash away at an invisible enemy that is the myth of courage, on an invisible battlefield that is the Vietnam veteran's mind.
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.
Life can sometime bring unwanted events that individuals might not be willing to face it. This was the conflict of O’Brien in the story, “On The Rainy River”. As the author and the character O’Brien describes his experiences about the draft to the Vietnam War. He face the conflict of whether he must or must not go to the war, in this moment O’Brien thinking that he is so good for war, and that he should not be lost in that way. He also show that he disagree with the consbet of the war, how killing people will benefit the country. In addition O’Brien was terrifying of the idea of leaving his family, friends, and everything that he has done in the past years.
Love has the power to do anything. Love can heal and love can hurt. Love is something that is indescribable and difficult to understand. Love is a feeling that cannot be accurately expressed by a word. In the poem “The Rain” by Robert Creeley, the experience of love is painted and explored through a metaphor. The speaker in the poem compares love to rain and he explains how he wants love to be like rain. Love is a beautiful concept and through the abstract comparison to rain a person is assisted in developing a concrete understanding of what love is. True beauty is illuminated by true love and vice versa. In other words, the beauty of love and all that it entails is something true.
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.
In the novel, “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien, he describes parts of his war experiences through the stories told throughout the book. O’Brien discusses the gory detailed chaos of the Vietnam war and his fellow “soldiers.” As O’Brien gives detail of the his “fictional” experiences, he explains why he joined the war. He also describes a time where his “character” wanted to escape a draft to Canada.
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.