Bringing The Past With You Short Story

In the short story “The Things They Carried”, Tim O’Brien wrote about the experience of war and the feelings young soldiers felt during their long days of travel. During the story he keeps referring back to the things the soldiers chose to carry in their packs. Some of these items included necessity items like grenades and ammunition, but they also carry sentimental items like love letters and pictures. These items help the reader better understand each person for who they are and help us to understand the physical situation the soldiers are in. In “The Things They Carried”, Tim O’Brien describes the item the soldiers carry in their packs and the emotional weight they carry to help give a better

In The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien, the first chapter of the book titled The Things They Carried describes the kind of emotional toll experiencing war does to an individual which extends from their very own safety, to emotional burdens distracting them from war, to their life before the war. Obrien forms a connection between the object and the individual, he uses parallel structure to list the objects and their reasons for being carried, and he forms an unemotional and straightforward tone throughout the chapter.

He begins by explaining that Jimmy Cross has an obsession, and her name is Martha. “First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried letters from a girl named Martha, a junior at Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey. They were not love letters, but Lieutenant Cross was hoping, so he kept them folded in plastic at the bottom of his rucksack” (pg. 1, line 1). Although Jimmy Cross wished they were love letters he would still continue to go crazy about them. ”He would sometimes taste the envelope flaps, knowing her tongue had been there.” (pg.1, line 9) Jimmy Cross could not wait to see Martha as he continued to constantly have her on his mind. While constantly thinking about Martha, Lavender continues to be briefly mentioned then after, Jimmy Cross starts blaming himself for the death of Lavender, but the platoon knows they must move on, as the emotional effect of this story begins to lean towards the physical state of mind on the war, such as the weapons and explosives. This starts to calm down the narrator and his emotional level, however the constant reminder of not seeing Lavender, triggers his emotions and finally continues to bring up more detail about what happened after the death. This brings out the more emotional side of the story and the narrator explains what Lieutenant Cross thinks about the death of Lavender since he could not stop thinking

Jimmy Cross carries a picture of his love, Martha, with him every step he takes has he fights in the Vietnam War. He has a picture of her playing volleyball and a picture of her leaning against a wall. As he daydreams about Martha, Jimmy Cross feels hope and motivation to fight through the war and make it home to see his love. Martha does not love him back but Jimmy still fantasies about all the things he wants to experience with Martha. Because of Jimmy’s love for Martha and how he can look at the photos all night and day, these pictures symbolize hope and motivation but also distraction. The photos are a distraction to Jimmy. While he is thinking about the photos and dreaming of Martha, his men have died due to his distraction. The morning after Ted Lavender died he burned the pictures and the letters, but he knew he “couldn’t burn the blame” (494). After he burned the letters he remembers that, “...his

Tim O’Brien’s short story “The Things They Carried” is about a platoon of seventeen soldiers that are in the Vietnam war. The focus of the story is on First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross going back and forth from Vietnam and his memory for Martha, “an English major at Mount Sebastian” (323). The narration bounces around during the telling of the story, as if the story is being told from memory years after the war. The narration of the story is told around the death of one of the soldiers, Ted Lavender. As the platoon “humped” (324) through the Vietnam wilderness outside the village of Than Khe, the narrator gives the reader lists of military issued equipment and what each piece weighs. “They would never be at a loss for things to carry” (332) for these lists changed depending on the mission and the soldiers mental state, as does their weight. Along with their military issued equipment they also carry personal belongings, as well as emotional baggage. This essay will analyze the personal and emotional things they carry and whether they are helpful or a burden.

In the first chapter in the book, titled The Things They Carried, Jimmy Cross is one of the many examples throughout the novel in where a soldier has a way to escape from the realities of war. Cross, who is a lieutenant in his company, carries two photographs of a girl named Martha whom he truly loves and wishes nothing else but to be with her in the end. Along with the photographs, he carries letters from Martha herself as well as her good-luck pebble in his mouth. Martha’s letters has a huge impact on Cross’s escape on reality because those letters do not mention war at all but for him to stay safe. All of these items comforts Cross and eventually reminisce about the times when he was back home with Martha away from any war. He relives a moment when he was with Martha at the movies, and then remembers that he touched her knee but Martha did not approve and pushed his hands away. Now while he’s in Vietnam, he does nothing but fantasizes taking her to her bed, tying her up, and touching that one knee knee all night long.

Through the exchange of letters between Lt. Jimmy Cross and the center of his infatuation Martha in “The Things They Carried”, he allowed himself to become more obsessed with the thought of her. The letters simply state the events Martha encounter in her daily life, lines

Jimmy Cross knows Martha does not love him that not a bomb cell of his life. However he still clinging, and hoping and fantasizing on the idea of Martha is in love him. Martha is connected to life back home that is wonderful and beautiful. O’Brien writes “He would image romantic camping trips into the mountains in New Hampshire.” (O’Brien). She represents everything soft, tender like poetry. “About her respect for Chaucer and her great affection for Virginia Woolf. She often quoted lines of poetry,” (O’Brien’s). That is, unlike than the super masculine world of war that he is facing now. He is now living hard, harsh and difficult world of war all the time. First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross needs obsession with Martha because that is his brain’s survival mechanism. Martha writes Jimmy Cross about the world she belongs at, gives him fantasies of the world back home to help him survive The Vietnam

Jimmy's transformation begins when he decides to burn the pictures and letters of his girlfriend, Martha. To be a leader in war was meaningless to Jimmy Cross compared to the love he had for Martha. Cross' subsequent burning of Martha's letters suggests that he's determined to put such romantic ideas behind him. He repeatedly convinces himself that there will be no more fantasies about Martha. The burning of Martha’s things is symbolically used by O’Brien to signify a turning point in Cross’ development. Cross realizes that Martha's feelings for him were not those of love, for she is an English major, a girl who lives in the world of words. Cross was rationalizing his un-requiting love for Martha to create a “home world” inside his mind so that he could mentally escape from the war when he needed to.

This is the crucial turning point for Lt. Cross. He reaches the crossroad where he must choose between his men or continue the drug us of Martha and be transported to fantasy land. “But didn’t” (358) tells us exactly which path he chose. He burns the letters and photos of Martha, symbolizing his desire to forget about that life, and moves forward with contemplating how to dispose of the pebble. “Everything seemed part of everything else, the fog and Martha” (357) comparing Martha to the fog. Fog is gray, dense and prevents one to see clearly, and that was Martha. When he was high on Martha, he couldn’t see clearly and he couldn’t think clearly. “…deepening rain. It was a war, after all… Lt. Jimmy Cross took out his maps… shook his head hard, as if to clear it…” (357), it is the symbolism of the rain that clears out his thinking, and washing away the distraction. This is the first time we see the leader in Lt. Cross emerge. He takes out his “map to plan the day’s march… and they would head west… country green and inviting” (358). This passage allows us to get a glimpse of the new Lt. Cross who is putting his men first, planning out the day’s travel, with plans to leave the darkness behind and head towards life and

Jimmy Cross, they met at a college in New Jersey but nothing sparked between them besides a friendship. There isn't any hope of them ever being together but Jimmy Cross still thinks about her constantly everyday. In one particular letter she sends him a good-luck-pebble. "Martha wrote that she had found the pebble on the Jersey shoreline and carried it in her breast pocket for several days" (8). Jimmy Cross reads the letter spends hours wondering who she was at the beach with, if she was with a man, if they were a couple. When the women sent letters home, it really helped keep the morale of the soldier's. Although Martha continues to kind of mislead Jimmy when she signs the letters "love." "Ted Lavender was shot in the head on his way back from peeing. He lay with his mouth open" (12).

One critic states that “Though Cross is distracted and dreamy about a girl Martha, he also carries the responsibility for the lives of his men. (Plot Summary). For example, the author tells a story about what he carries. He tells about how his friend Ted happens to die. While he was on watch Ted was shot. All he could think about was how Ted dropped “like cement”(O’Brien 6). Also the only reason that “Ted Lavender was dead was because he loved Martha so much and could not stop thinking about her” (O’Brien 6). He was thinking about running on the beach with Martha, a girl from back home. In reality, this girl does not love him but she acts like she does or tends to lead him on because he is going away to war. As this is a play on him in the book maybe she is just trying to give him something to look forward to after the war. She send him a rock from the beach that he kept in his mouth and would leave it their tasting the sea salt. Also, he had a photo of her and would often wonder who took the photo of her when he would look at the one of the two she gave him. This is suspenseful because not only does one want to know if he ever talks to her again after what happens. In addition, after his tragic death he threw the rock and burn the pictures so that he would not ever be distracted again. Every time he thought of the death of his friend it made him feel more guilty.

While memories can hurt, they build people into who they are today. The book The Things They Carried, written by Tim O’Brien, is written in a non-linear format. The nonlinear format mimics one’s memories. O’Brien waits 20 years to begin writing this book because it took time to process what he has gone through. O’Brien shares many short stories about other in his group and the situations they faced during the Vietnam War.

“He pictured Martha’s smooth young face, thinking he loved her more than anything, more than his men, and now Ted Lavender was dead because he loved her so much and couldn’t stop thinking about her”(6-7). Cross then starts to blame himself for the death that has occurred. Joanna McCarthy says “He suffers with guilt because he was thinking of Martha at the moment that Lavender was killed—he has loved her more than his men”. If he had been focused on what he was in Vietnam for, and not daydreaming about spending time with Martha, he could have been a better lookout and noticed that Lavender had left from their

“The Things They Carried” provides a personal view into the minds of soldiers, and tells us the emotional and psychological costs of war. The soldiers may have carried physical objects, but some of these objects connect to a deeper psychological weight most do not see.