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The subjection of truth to storytelling in the things they carried
The subjection of truth to storytelling in the things they carried
The things they carried tim o' brien
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In Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, O’Brien explores the nature of stories and what role truth plays in being able to deliver a story and convey its weight to an audience. Throughout the course of the novel O’Brien gives many accounts and his characters recount many tall-tales as well. All of these stories pose questions to the reader, and O’Brien contends that a story’s purpose is to help the audience member feel the reality of what happened and remember those who have died. Rat Kiley has a propensity for exaggeration and O’Brien states that the other platoon members has become conditioned to discredit about 60% of everything he said. For example, if Rat said he had slept with four women, it was safe to assume he slept with about one and a half. This aversion to the truth and compulsion to magnify the facts, however, was not meant as a device to deceive. His story in which a squad of men go up into the mountains to a listening post and start hearing cocktail …show more content…
In his last chapter O’Brien weaves a tale of when he first fell in love at the age of nine and how, although she has now departed the land of the living, he can still remember her and keep her alive through telling stories about her. In just the same way he can honor and remember those lost in Vietnam by recounting their exploits. These stories, regardless of their historic accuracy, serve to awaken the memory and kindle the emotions so that the dead may live on in the memories of those who loved them. That is the power of a story. O’Brien’s The Things They Carried asks the question of what stories are and their function. Throughout his novel and the character tales within it he unravels a story’s ability to tell the emotional truth of an event—even at the expense of the historical truth—and its power to keep the dead alive in the hearts and minds of those who remember
There are over thirty genres of books in the world. All of stories are told and written in many different forms from written to spoken, action to romance, or fiction to non-fiction. But, all stories have something in common--a theme that is intended to make a difference to the reader. No matter what the story is about, it is centered around a strong theme. The author of The Things They Carried, Tim O'Brien., uses a separate theme in each of his vignettes. But, these themes aren't always depicted through truth. "I'm forty-three years old, true, and I'm a writer now , and a long time ago I walked through Quang Ngai Province as a foot soldier. Almost everything else is invented"(171). O'Brien uses story-truth and happening-truth in The Things They Carried to show a great theme. In certain cases in the book, story-truth shows theme better and happening-truth isn't used and vice versa. In the vignette "The
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien may be a war story, but it is also a collection of stories about people. Not all of these stories are completely factual, either, but they were never intended to be. O’Brien presents these not-quite-truths not to deceive, but because while the real events may have been more factual, it didn’t mean they were more real. What is true and what is simply fabrication become interchangeable, bringing to life the chaotic experiences the author felt as a soldier in the Vietnam War. This quote would be an appropriate epigraph because the author has taken cares to highlight that the exact events and facts of the war aren’t as important as the people who took part in it and trying to understand their experiences and
The impact of the Vietnam War upon the soldiers who fought there was huge. The experience forever changed how they would think and act for the rest of their lives. One of the main reasons for this was there was little to no understanding by the soldiers as to why they were fighting this war. They felt they were killing innocent people, farmers, poor hard working people, women, and children were among their victims. Many of the returning soldiers could not fall back in to their old life styles. First they felt guilt for surviving many of their brothers in arms. Second they were haunted by the atrocities of war. Some soldiers could not go back to the mental state of peacetime. Then there were soldiers Tim O’Brien meant while in the war that he wrote the book “The Things They Carried,” that showed how important the role of story telling was to soldiers. The role of stories was important because it gave them an outlet and that outlet was needed both inside and outside the war in order to keep their metal state in check.
The vast majority of heroes in novels display courage frequently, making it a characteristic praised by many. Once a character demonstrates their cowardly nature, he becomes looked down upon. Those unlucky enough can be named weak, wimpy, chicken, and so forth; however many do not understand that both courage and timidness are intertwined. In the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien, the author indicates that courage can be driven by both fear and cowardice.
In The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien, moral ambiguity is often present in order to distort the reader’s judgement on whether the characters are purely good or purely evil. The contrast between the two characteristics depend on the situation the narrator is in. At a time of war, morality is not questioned or thought of because of the surroundings and nature of war. Tim O’Brien uses his experience in which his moral ambiguity is present and shares his story with readers of this book. The moral ambiguity relates to the plot by revealing the effects of war and the experiences soldiers endured during their combat.
“I survived, but it's not a happy ending. I was a coward. I went to the war.” The Things They Carried, written by Tim O’Brien, provides the reader with perplexing contradictions, just like the one above, throughout the entirety of the novel. O’Brien questions everything from what it truly means to be a “man,” to what it means to tell a “true” war story. Many of the ideas O’Brien tries to imbibe on his readers are further explained in literature. More specifically, poetry. Poets Felix Pollak, Denise Levertov, and Yusef Komunyakaa all assimilate elements of O’Brien’s beliefs and views on war into their own work.
All life proves amazement. When life becomes lost, there proves great sadness. The loss of a loved one or loss of oneself proves great sorrow. Many writers wrote about loss and sadness. Subsequently, only great writers can write about loss in a truly happy story. In the three short stories “Gwilan’s Harp” By Ursula K. Le Guin, “The Washwoman” by Bashevis Singer, and “The Last Leaf” by William Sydney Porter, more commonly known as O. Henry, all experienced loss in stories with a happy domineer.
Secondly, on the seventh chapter named “ How to Tell a True War Story,” O’Brien explains how many fake stories end up in triumph and have some kind of moral. On page 68, he states, “If at the end of a war story you feel uplifted, or if you feel that some small bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie.” This shows how the after effects of war aren’t as joyful, this also mentions how there isn’t any rectitude that is kept after the war. This is because in war you are supposed to kill your enemy. It doesn’t
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.
Several stories into the novel, in the section, “How to tell a true war story”, O’Brien begins to warn readers of the lies and exaggerations that may occur when veterans tell war stories.
He has taken many of the incidents that he experienced while at war and made up other truths, to help clarify his point, and to take away from the tragedy within the story itself. Furthermore, O’Brien says, “we kept the dead alive with stories” (226). While at war you meet many people, and you lose many people. These soldiers, would tell stories to make it seem like the friends they lost were still alive, in order to rid themselves of the sorrow they were having because of all the death they were experiencing. O’Brien, explains that when Rat Kiley would tell stories about Curt Lemon, by saying, “to listen to the story, especially as Rat Kiley told it, you’d never know that Curt Lemon was dead. He was still out there in the dark, naked and painted up, trick-or-treating, sliding from hootch to hootch in the crazy white ghost mask. But he was dead” (227). We are able to see here that their use of storytelling was not only a way of killing time, but also indeed a way to cope with the lost and tragic experiences they went through during war. Also, O’Brien states, “they’re all dead. But in a story, which is kind of dreaming, the dead sometimes smile and sit up and return to the world” (213). Once again we are able to see that these stories are used for much more than a way of passing time; however, as a useful method of coping with the events that took place. Perhaps, O’Brien
Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried portrays the struggles of soldier’s in war. The novel ultimately is a way for the author to cope with death and keep the memories of his platoon alive. Susan Wittig Albert writes:
Tim O’Brien, author of The Things They Carried, expresses his journey throughout the Vietnam War via a series of short stories. The novel uses storytelling to express the emotional toll the men encountered, as well as elucidate their intense experiences faced during the war. The literary theory, postmodernism, looks at these war experiences and questions their subjectivity, objectivity, and truth in a literary setting. It allows the reader to look through a lens that deepens the meaning of a work by looking past what is written and discovering the various truths. O’Brien used the storytelling process to illustrate the bleeding frame of truth. Through his unique writing style, he articulates the central idea of postmodernism to demonstrate the
O’Brien, Tim. “The Things They Carried.” The Story and Its Writer: An Introduction to Short Fiction. 8th ed. Ed. Ann Charters. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2003. 1001-1014. Print.
Possessions of Character in The Things They Carried "The Things They Carried," by Tim O'Brien, contains many references to "possessions of character. " Many things Lt. Cross carries were carried by all, including: military equipment, stationery, photographs, diseases, food, the land of Vietnam itself, their lives, and even more. O'Brien highlights these along with special things that Lt. Jimmy Cross carries. He, thus, reveals something of what Cross values. Belongings reflect his character and thoughts.