A True War Story in How to Tell a True War Story by Tim O’ Brien

O’Brien’s unification of fact and fiction is to illustrate the idea in which the real accuracy of a war story is less significant than storytelling. The subjective truth about what the war meant and what it did to change the soldiers is more meaningful than the technical details of the

Within the chapter “How to Tell a True War Story,” O’Brien writes about a story that Mitchell Sanders recounts to be true. The surrealist part is when Sanders talks about how they heard noises within the forests of Nam. Sanders says, “...but after a while they start hearing -you won’t believe this- they hear chamber music… Then after a while they hear gook opera and a glee club…” (Pg. 71). When he says this he is really adding details to pad the story up. Like when Sanders say, “The whole country. Vietnam. The place talks. It talks. Understand? Nam - it truly talks.” (Pg. 71). He means to say that he added those things that they heard because there were sounds they heard that couldn’t be explained. Later on he says that those things they heard

“This is true.” (O’Brien, 420) – with this simple statement which also represents a first, three-word introductory paragraph to Tim O’Brien’s short story, “How to Tell a True War Story”, the author reveals the main problem of what will follow. “Truth” – when looked up in a dictionary, we would probably find definitions similar to sincerity and honesty on the one hand, and correctness, accuracy or reality on the other hand. When looking at these definitions, one can make out two groups of meaning: While sincerity and honesty are very subjective, correctness or accuracy are supposed to be objective by nature. One can be sincere and still not report the truth, due to the simple fact

The first three words of the chapter “How to Tell a True War Story” are, “This is true” (67). Although Tim O’Brien begins this chapter with such a bold and clear statement, throughout the chapter he has the reader thinking and confused when he contradicts himself by stating things such as, “In many cases a true war story cannot

As you know I am writing to you from the trenches of the western front in France. The United States of America joined this heinous war in the spring of nineteen hundred seventeen. We joined the fight because of the sinking of the Lusitania and when the German Kiaser sent the note to Mexico to convince them to put themselves against us to assure we will not go to war in Europe. That did not go through because the economic condition of Mexico is not that good enough to fight in a war with the United States.

Throughout Tim O'Brien's short work "How to tell a true war story" O'Brien has two reoccurring themes. One is of the desensitization of the troops during their hardship regarding the events of the Vietnam War, and the other is of the concept of truth. Truth may seem simple enough to explain, but is in fact endowed with many layers. The story is chalked full of contradictions, as well as lies, and embellishments, and yet O'Brien claims that these are the truth. The truth, whether it be war or society's, is in fact a concept that can be conveyed many times and in many ways. Whereas each is independently untrue, the combined collaboration of these half-truths is in essence the only real truth.

The story begins, with the introduction of Jacob Kitino a wealthy Acholi boy, who is friends with Tony, a poor boy.They are going to school at the “George Jones Seminary for boys school” for the new school semester. They meets a boy, while they were walking at night. Jacob gives the boy money and bread, the the boy ran away, but Jacob never got his name. His name is Oteka, a very smart boy who was walking into Gulu to stay safe from the “LRA kidnappers”. This is considered the “Birth” of the “War Brothers” story because this is how the boys meet and a little bit about their backgrounds. The boys get to there school and they are excited to see each other again. Immediately after arriving they are asked to watch after small 12 year old boy named Norman. Later that night the LRA attaches their school, they break down the door and knocks them unconscious. When they wake up, Jacob and the boys are marching in the forest, tired and hungry. This the “Call to Adventure” because the boys are having a good day at school and next thing you know it all goes bad and they are now LRA soldiers.

After the Vietnam War, O’Brien wrote The Things They Carried. He does so to connect his audience to the events that happened during the war. Also, he wants people, who did not experience the effects of the war, understand how the war affects soldiers, their humanity, and what they left behind. In “How to Tell a True War Story” O’Brien’s message is to point out the events of the war, and that war stories are not always true because people have different views of how the war affected them. The whole book consisted of a plethora of metaphors, but without these other rhetorical devices O’Brien would not have been as effective in getting his point across thousands of people who read his book. Therefore, O’Brien used polysyndeton to further explain what war is, antithesis to explain why war stories are true and untrue, and repetition to ensure that his audience understand what he is trying to say.

War can be defined as “an active struggle between competing entities. It’s truly hard to tell who is right or wrong during a war. Both sides are fighting for what they believe in and what is true to their heart. In the end there is always two things promised – destruction and death. These two objects can explain the result in every facet of war from the physical to emotional.

The short story that will be discussed, evaluated, and analyzed in this paper is a very emotionally and morally challenging short story to read. Michael Meyer, author of the college text The Compact Bedford Introduction to Literature, states that the author of How to Tell a True War Story, Tim O’Brien, “was drafted into the Vietnam War and received a Purple Heart” (472). His experiences from the Vietnam War have stayed with him, and he writes about them in this short story. The purpose of this literary analysis is to critically analyze this short story by explaining O’Brien’s writing techniques, by discussing his intended message and how it is displayed, by providing my own reaction,

According to the Freytag's pyramid, a story must contain five parts: exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution. All throughout my life I've held these as irrevocable characteristics of a story; more in particular, that all stories must have a resolution. However, reading Tim O'Brian's “How to Tell a True War Story” has challenged this notion. O'Brian argues that a true story--a war story, in particular--doesn't necessarily have a satisfying resolution or a moral. War is too complex to render in simple terms; a true war story is neither about bravery nor heroism. Thus, based on these criteria, I'd argue that Lord Alfred Tennyson's piece, "The Charge of the Light Brigade," is not a true war story.

Jeffrey Asher LA11 1st hour Mrs. Howard 11/17/16 how to tell a true war story, essay this is how to tell a true war story. this is the book call The Things they Carry by Tim O'Brien. true war stories don't have a moral or a lesson. A true war story is dark and twisted. It is very hard to make up a war story unless the person is very sick minded. The story of How to Tell a True War Story is about a friend of Tim O'Brien's named Bob kiley but everybody calls him Rat. Rats friend Curt lemon stepped on a land mine as him and rat were goofing around like they always were. Afterward Rat sat down and wrote curt lemons sister a very sincere letter. In his letter he wrote about how good a friend and fellow comrade curt was, he volunteered for things

turning my head again I saw Simon dive to my aid. He did not utter a

     According to the author Tim O’Brien, people tend to readily accept the ‘facts’ presented of what happened during a war. People do not consider the existence of fallacies regarding the actual stories of what happens in wars, few consider that the ‘facts’ of an incident often change through people’s words. The film ‘Saving the Private Ryan’ by Steven Spielberg features both facts and seemingness part of the war story. Since it is so difficult to fully describe a war using human language, Spielberg ended up revising his stories to make sense out of it. Spielberg included parts that did not occur or exclude parts that did occur in order to make their stories seem more credible. According

1. “In any war story, especially a true one, it’s difficult to separate what happened from what seemed to happen. What seems to happen becomes its own happening and has to be told the way. “ (71)