Imagery In 'The Man I Killed And Ambush'

War is devastating and tragic. It affects the daily lives of the people that are involved in the war. In the excerpt from, A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah, it displays a man who is dreaming about war. When the man wakes up, he lays sweating on the ground, remembering the painful memories that the dream has brought. In the end, the man realizes that from now on he will have to live in three worlds; his dreams, the experience of his new life, and memories from the past. Meanwhile, in the image, “In Times of War” by The New York Times, there is an angel on a cloud looking over the dreadful war. Then the angel walks away because the view of people dying makes it sick. The theme of the excerpt A Long Way Gone, and the image, “In Times of War,” is that the war brings death, seriously injured, and psychologically broken people.

Traumatized Literary devices are what make the story come alive and give the reader a feeling of actually being there. The literary devices increase a reader’s interest in the story and also helps keep the audience engaged. They help create a more fascinating plot. In the short story “Ambush” by TIm O’brien uses them to develop a character so much more. Mr. O’brien used internal conflict, external conflict, and flashback to put the reader in the character’s “shoes” throughout the story.

Lastly, the war changed the sniper by misplacing him. The sniper is described as a young person. “His face was the face of a student, thin and aesthetic, but his eyes had the cold gleam of the fanatic.” The use of strong adjectives such as “thin and aesthetic” and “the cold gleam of a fanatic” show how the sniper is misplaced in this environment. Further into the text, youthful guilt became apparent. “The sniper looked at his enemy falling and he shuddered. The lust of battle died in him. He became bitten with remorse.” This use of metaphor shows the reader how quickly his emotions change, showing his guilt and regret for what he has done. Lastly, the snipers curiosity was influenced, as he felt he needed to find out the identity of his victim. He felt this because of how the misplacement had

Though the men reacted in violent ways in different situations, O’Brian’s violent act was something that stayed with him for the rest of his life and completely changed who he was as a person. “The Man I Killed” describes in detail the man and his life Tim O’Brien killed on a path in the jungle, even though he obviously did not know the man’s personal background, but mimicked it after his own. This description shows O’Brien’s life came to an end at his first act of violence, mirrored in the loss of the man’s life. After O’Brien’s incident on the pathway, he became cold and exemplified this new disposition after Jorgenson almost allowed O’Brien to die from a bullet wound, and in turn O’Brien needed pay back by scaring him in the middle of the night. The war may have physically killed many, but in this sense it damaged every soldier mentally.

z Teynor Hour 3 War: The Ultimate Paradox In today’s society truth is definite, if something is true, then it must of happened. However, throughout The Things They Carried, the blurring between reality and imagination represents the confusion and moral ambiguity of war.

“The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner” by Randall Jarrell is able to accomplish so many thing with so little lines-mainly through the use of metaphor and diction. It explains the terrors of wars in gruesome detail and explains the ways in which wars, in a sense “breed” and “birth” death. To some, this poem is seen as the ultimate poem of war, and rightly

The poet insisted, “Eyes the shady night has shut / Cannot see the record cut” (Housman 13-14). Housman metaphorically justifies that death is not a menacing occurrence in a person’s life, comparing it to sleeping on a shady night. With this seemingly bare comment, Housman reveals his valiantness of death and his supportive perspective on dying young. Moreover, Maupassant implemented imagery in “Two Friends” to demonstrate that friendship triumphs over death. He wrote that “Monsieur Sauvage fell forward instantaneously. Morissot, being the taller, swayed slightly and fell across his friend with face turned skyward and blood oozing from a rent in the breast of his coat (Maupassant 448)”. In the climax, great friends Monsieur Sauvage and Monsieur Morissot ungrudgingly were willing to die together rather than revealing the location of their country’s soldiers. Maupassant was purposeful in his word choices to create an image of two friends dying together, even if they had the choice to betray their country and escape. Thus, imagery is a powerful literary device to justify the authors’ purposes of writing.

At the same time, O’Brien struggles with destructiveness of the conflicting images of violence and peace in death through the juxtaposition of the imagery of the dead man. While “his one eye was shut, the other eye was a star-shaped hole.” The dead man has one shut eye that resembles a peaceful sleep, while the other side is obliterated by the grenade into a star-shaped hole. The image of the star-shaped hole in the dead soldier’s eye represents the hopes that he once had when he was alive: “He hoped the Americans would go away. Soon, he hoped. He kept hoping and hoping, always” (119). Furthermore, “his right cheek was smooth and hairless,” an image of untouched innocence that contrasts with his left cheek, which was “peeled back in three ragged strips,” destroyed by the violence O’Brien inflicts upon it. The juxtaposition of the butterfly that settles on his chin and the fatal wound on his neck, “open to the spinal cord…blood…thick and shiny” illustrate the complexity and ambiguity of the unnaturalness of war, depicted by the image of the dead man’s wrung neck, contrasted with the ironic peace and naturalism of death in the image of the fragile butterfly. These select images are also those that O’Brien chooses to fixate upon and develop throughout the chapter as he struggles to comprehend the moral implications of his actions. The innocence of the “slim, dead, almost dainty young man” is further reinforced when O’Brien describes his wrists as “wrists of a

In the first part of the poem the writer shows the difficulty he is having with taking a human life. In the second stanza he says “Making night work for us the starlight scope bringing men into killing range. This dark tone helps to emphasize the struggle the author is feeling as a soldier in war. Also he shows his emotions directly. In stanza 3 he says “The river under Vi Bridge takes the heart away”. This quote shows the feeling that the author gets

Pain is something that few can resist showing, because on some level their survival depends on releasing some anguish. The eyes show all too readily the blunt realities of our world. They do this through more than tears, because some people have seen things so horrible and wretched that they have forgotten how to cry. One has but to look deeper, and the sparkle of his eye will tell a thousand stories far greater than with what the Arabian Nights ever enchanted its audiences.

People who have never experienced the war portray it as “grotesque.” (O’Brien 77) They’ve never truly listened to the soldier's stories, Tim O’Brien is able to find beauty within the “awful majesty of combat.” (O’Brien 77) The metaphor comparing the “trace rounds” to “brilliant red ribbons” illustrate the war in a completely different light. (O’Brien 77) The respect for “the fluid symmetries of troops” shows the organization of the war and the training and preparing that the troops do to serve our country and protect Americans. (O’Brien 77) There is beauty within these individuals and their stories of why they decided to risk their lives to protect us. Tim O’Brien’s simile comparing a “bombing raid” or “artillery barrage” to “a killer forest fire” or “cancer under a microscope” explains the “aesthetic purity” within the war. (O’Brien 77) Tim O’Brien puts the war into an idea that his readers can understand, he proves it’s possible to find beauty even in a

To kill a man is to take away everything he has, and ever will have; and in War, death is inescapable. Vietnam War veteran Tim O’Brien was drafted to fight in the War in 1969 and states in the book as his “character/narrator” self that he attempted an escape to Canada out of fear. But the stronger fear of people being ashamed of him took over and had him turning back to home to enlist in the U.S. Army. O’Brien published The Things They Carried in 1990 and explored the physical and mental realms of war-time combat with stories. These stories are based on his own experiences, but they include a fictionalized version of himself as “the narrator” and are said to only be what felt like the truth rather than being the actual truth. Despite this, the intention of these stories are to give readers the understanding of what it was like to be a soldier fighting for their life and country overseas. In the chapter “The Man I Killed”, the narrator tells the story of a man he killed outside the village of My Khe who was “a citizen and a soldier” of Vietnam (119). Although this man was the enemy, O’Brien’s character displays how ending another’s life in battle is not an easy pill to swallow. O’Brien, the narrator, uses repetitive descriptions, vivid and gory details, and his glum emotional response to the fatality he caused in the chapter to illustrate how feeling responsible for another man’s death can have traumatic effects on the mind.

Since the beginning of time, humans have sought after power and control. It is human instinct to desire to be the undisputed champion, but when does it become a problem? Warfare has been practiced throughout civilization as a way to justify power. Though the orders come directly from one man, thousands of men and women pay the ultimate sacrifice. In Randall Jerrell’s “The Death of a Ball Turret Gunner”, Jarrell is commenting on the brutality of warfare. Not only does Jarrell address the tragedies of war, he also blames politics, war leaders, and the soldier’s acknowledgement of his duties. (Hill 6) With only five lines of text, his poems allows the reader to understand what a soldier can go through. With the use of Jerrell’s poem, The Vietnam War, and Brian Turner’s “Ameriki Jundee”, the truth of combat will be revealed.

The poet then presents a scene of patriotic relevance as he describes a scene of a regiment marching into battle with their “flag” and “Eagle with crest of red and gold” (17-18). When people think of flags, they think of patriotism and representing their country. Eagles also symbolize freedom but as readers can witness in the work, the poet makes it seem as if these men were created not to enjoy the gift of life for one moment by him saying “These men were born to drill and die” (19). This comes across to the reader as almost inhumane. Then by illustrating an image of a field of thousands of dead corpses makes any reader wonder why people even go to war. The whole fourth stanza paints a picture of living human being going into a battle with most, if not any, making it out alive. Like stated before, the speaker in the poem builds a case for those people that opposed to war even though the title of the poem might

Images, such as paintings and photographs, are intensely visually striking and evoke strong emotions in those who view them.“Into the Jaws of Death” provides a perfect example of that intensity, having been taken by Robert F. Sargent during the early morning hours of the D-Day invasion of Normandy. Even today the famous photograph evokes strong emotional reactions in many people who view it. This photograph served a purpose more significant than was realized at the time, to the point of becoming a pivotal point in support for the war effort. How was this accomplished? By conveying personal themes of heroism, patriotism, and mortality through devices such as angles, colors, uniforms, and proxemics.