Analysis Of The Secret Lives Of Sgt. John Wilson

In the chapter, “The Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong”, we meet an interesting character named Mary Anne. She was a seventeen year old lady who just got out of high school and went to visit her boyfriend Mark Fossie in Vietnam. It started out as just visiting a childhood sweetheart, except it all changed in a matter of weeks. Mary Anne began to take too much interest and she became engulfed in vietnam. She wasn’t all too careful, rather than her swallowing the land, she was swallowed whole by it. Vietnam changed Mary Anne into something she never thought that she would become, she changed into a lone soldier, physically, behaviorally and psychologically.

Mary Hightower is a self-proclaimed expert that has given herself the status as being the mother of the many children stuck in the afterlife welcoming them with open hands. At the beginning, she seems to be a good character as the story proceeds, she’s shown to be neutral and towards the end she becomes the antagonist. When Nick, Allie, and Lief first encounter Mary she appears to be just a leader to the Afterlights retaining them from harm and making sure their delighted. Allie later notices that Mary is selfish keeping the children in an endless loop and would sacrifice anything to keep them from going in peace and is constantly competing with Nick.

Mary Hutchinson was by far the most glorious and loving person through-out the novel, caring, passionate, and loved by all that knew her. She was a young seamstress who lived a simple life making an honest living and was very close to her loving family. She had been pursued by her co-worker the young Jack Wilson who fall in love with her (or so she thought), but it was normal for people to be attracted to her beautiful nature. After years of courting they had finally gotten married and had children of their own although the second would not be born until the “father” I say vaguely had left the country. This once highly sought after woman would now be left to care for two young children while her husband moved countries to find work (not to mention flee

Mary Ann, the cute blond with the cosmetic bag and pink sexy sweater portrays the perfect picture of a high school sweetheart of the seventies. She is being imported "with the daily resupply shipment" and presented as an object of the men's enjoyment. "The men genuinely liked her" means they liked what they saw, her body. But this image of Mary

We are introduced to Mary as the pregnant wife of Presbyterian minister Amasa Dempster by Dunstan’s role in the snowball incident. We also learn that everyone in her life, including her husband and son, deserted her during her mental decline save her aunt and Dunstan himself. While all this information gives weight to her functional role in the story we never learn what drove Mary’s early life. Our insight into Mary’s life is limited to Dunstan’s interactions with her during and after the snowball incident, leaving her only somewhat developed as a character. Dunstan’s feeling of responsibility for Mary and her impact on the plot of the story both stem from the aforementioned snowball incident during Dunstan’s adolescence.

War. War does something to the mind, it changes they way you are, it turns you into someone you won't recognize. The chapter “Sweetheart Of The Song Tra Bong” from the story “The Things They Carried” By Tim O’brien, shows a young adult woman who has been sent to war to see her boyfriend, using the psychological lens you can see how war changed who she is. In the beginning of the chapter you see this young girl named Mary Anne, she has a boyfriend at war, his name is Mark Fossie.

She possessed a vibrant and vivacious personality and spoke her mind freely from childhood; friendly, sharp-witted and outgoing, she made friends easily, however she never hesitated to express to loved ones exactly what or how she thought they should handle a situation. This of course as everyone knew was regardless of her opinion being was solicited or not. This no doubt was the result of growing up as the baby of the family. Mary grew quite accustomed to getting her own way with her older siblings, Marvin and Corinne and growing up, surrounded by a bounty of loving family members; aunts, uncles and cousins.

As she becomes more curious about the land, Mary Anne develops a disinterest in femininity, ultimately becoming indifferent towards social and gender

When Mary Anne arrives she is a happy, pretty, innocent young lady and she is very well liked by many. After a couple of days of being at camp Mary Anne starts participating more in the war and begins to distance herself from Mark. Mary Anne was too drawn into the war life “A haunted look, Rat said- partly terror, partly rapture. It was as if she

“The Secret Lives of Sgt. John Wilson” is a book based in a true story written by Lois Simmie. The book follows the life of John Wilson, also known as Jack, and Polly Hutchinson, or Mary Wilson. It explains how they fell in love, married, had children and how John was accepted into the Royal North West Mounted Police. After his acceptance into the RNWMP he moved from his home in Scotland and immigrated to Saskatchewan, Canada. From there on John created a second life, always avoided questions about his first life by being deceitful, which ultimately lead t him murdering his wife to live his other life peacefully. Although his efforts were in vain, as he was eventually convicted of the murder of his

Mary Ann was separated from her husband Richard due to infidelity. Matt was fond of Mary Ann, and just as he worried about his own children, he began to worry about Mary Ann and the troubles of her life. Matt and his wife, Ruth, had opposing views of their son’s relationship with Mary Ann. Ruth focused on all the negative aspects of Mary Ann; like having two young boys, her reputation which led to her separation from Richard, the fact that she was older than Frank, and most of all, not yet divorced. On the other hand, Matt saw the positive side of Frank and Mary Ann’s relationship.

Being ill, she was unable to do much. Although, she did make a fellow friend who was ill because of the sanitarium. Her name was Agatha Holloway. She was soon to be engaged, had a job, and what seemed like a good life, until the illness hit her. Agatha asked Mary questions on marriage, which Mary replied with uncertainty. Being a young mother, she lacked experience. Her kind heart gave her the best answer she could, though.

Mary is also struggling against a feeling of displacement. It’s ironic that the two things she places most importance on are the two things she doesn’t posses. Her parents ignore her up until their deaths and she has no friends due to a bitter

Rat explains that “he loved her” infact they all did (25), they loved the idea of this independent, free spirited, wild women that she had become. They were drawn to her lack of innocence and mystery. This lack of innocence is the most substantial change in Mary Anne’s

The following quote from Greer’s story illustrates how Mary might be feeling when she comes home and accepts that the man she loved is gone and her son does not care for her “We think we know them. We think we love them. But what we love turns out to be a poor translation…” (Text 3, L. 2-3). In the end Mary has nothing left in life, the family dynamic is officially broken and nobody is there to keep the family together, this is what Mary