Review Of ' The Things They Carried '

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien is a wonderful and personal look into one of this countries darkest times. The vivid imagery that the author uses lets the reader actually experience the feeling of actually being in the war. By using the cultural studies method of literary criticism, we can use the social conditions during the time of the writing to explore beneath the surface. What we find underneath just might be more interesting than the story itself.

In The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien tells the tale of not about war, but rather about war’s effect on one’s mentality. Ultimately, this novel is built on a foundation of the items that the soldiers of the Vietnam War carried. Whether it was the way Jimmy Cross uses the pebble to escape from his duties as a soldier or when Norman Bowker realizes that courage comes form within, not from receiving a Silver Star; O’Brien uses baggage as a symbol throughout the book to teach that war does in fact change people. These possessions were not just materialistic, they made up the soldiers’ attributes, made up the soldiers’ persona and made up the soldier.

The Things They Carried is a collection of stories about the Vietnam War that the author, Tim O’Brien, uses to convey his experiences and feelings about the war. The book is filled with stories about the men of Alpha Company and their lives in Vietnam and afterwards back in the United States. O’Brien captures the reader with graphic descriptions of the war that make one feel as if they were in Vietnam. The characters are unique and the reader feels sadness and compassion for them by the end of the novel. To O’Brien the novel is not only a compilation of stories, but also a release of the fears, sadness, and anger that he has felt because of the Vietnam War.

In the story The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien shows the reader a sense of depressing love. O’Brien uses the physical weight carried by the soldiers as a motif for the emotional burdens they must endure while fighting in Vietnam. A love of which is portrayed in the story with a soldier loving a woman more than his fellow soldiers. But this woman does not love him in the same way. O’Brien uses many literary devices throughout the story, and shall be covered in this text. The tone in the text is very prevalent, and O’Brien gives the reader easy access to find and understand them.

“The Things They Carried’ by Tim O’Brien is a novel whose theme is not only related to soldiers but to everyday people as well. The theme of this novel lies in the struggles that soldiers bear, both physically and emotionally. The title —The Things They Carried— and most of

In “The Things They Carried” Tim O’Brien uses this story as a coping mechanism; to tell part of his stories and others that are fiction from the Vietnamese War. This is shown by using a fictions character’s voice, deeper meaning in what soldier’s carried, motivation in decision making, telling a war story, becoming a new person and the outcome of a war in one person. Tim O’ Brien uses a psychological approach to tell his sorrows, and some happiness from his stories from the war. Each part, each story is supposed to represent a deeper meaning on how O’Brien dealt, and will deal with his past. In war, a way to

“Tim O’Brien is obsessed with telling a true war story. O 'Brien 's fiction about the Vietnam experience suggest, lies not in realistic depictions or definitive accounts. As O’Brien argues, absolute occurrence is irrelevant because a true war story does not depend upon that kind of truth. Mary Ann’s induction into genuine experience is clearly destructive as well as empowering” (p.12) Tim O’s text, The Things they Carried, details his uses of word choice to portray his tone and bias. Tim O’Brien uses Martha to represents the idea of home and all it attendant images. He also uses letters and quotes to convey his image. Despite the fact that women assume a little part in The Things They Carried, it is a critical one. The Female characters Martha, Mary Anne Bell, and Kathleen Cross all affect the lives of the soldiers . Tim O’Brien uses the female role to portray his view and thoughts on his true war story which depict the lack of morality.

The novel, The Things They Carried is a story of one man’s accounts resulting to his tour of duty in Vietnam. Many of the men that are discussed in the book continued to be effected by the war, long after they returned home. Men were left emotionally scared, even if they managed to get out of the war physically unharmed. The

The Things They Carried is a work of historical fiction written by Vietnam war veteran, Tim O’Brien. This novella is a collection of linked short stories about American soldiers serving in the Vietnam war. The novella contains a numerous amount of deep,complex characters who help characterize each other. In the The Things They Carried, Tim O'Brien characterizes the soldiers through the round female characters

The Things They Carried is a novel that depicts the physical and mental things soldiers had to carry with them during and after Vietnam through the use of multiple short stories about different soldiers in the Vietnam War. Each of the short stories concentrated on a different aspect, but combined to form an overall life lesson about what these young men went through and what they carried with them in their life once the war started. A repeating

In “The Things they Carried,” Tim O’Brien uses contrasts and contradictions to reveal the impact that war had on people throughout the novel. The war had a great impact on all the characters, however, it affected Tim O’Brien, Mitchell Sanders, and Mary Anne the greatest. O’Brien is affected by the war the most, especially in the fact that he was the one who wrote a book about it. He begins the novel by describing experiences of him and his comrades. He discusses a moment in which Mitchel Sanders had gone home after a time in the war, and was having a perfect life.

In war, the characteristics of a soldier, civilian, and the nation as a whole can change drastically due to the nature of war. A person introduced to war is physically and mentally changed because of the traumatic experiences they encounter. Tim O’Brien uses contrasts and contradictions in his novel, The Things They Carried, to reveal how the characters are affected by the war in Vietnam and how their personalities shift through it. The characters who are impacted by the war are exposed to its horrors and are traumatized forever. While in the vicious jungles of Vietnam, the soldiers in war get weary and homesick.

The role of women in Tim O'brien's “The Things They Carry” is one of a escapist fantasy and innocence among other things. What do I mean by that? The women always play in some way, a way for the men who fought as way of coping. Such as Martha Cross’s “girlfriend” a woman that he uses to help cope that he’s at war. or Kathleen Tim’s daughter is one of innocence, asking tim to write a story about a girl who wins a million dollars and buys a shetland pony. The women in the story have a role and this role is very important and this why.

In the story, The Things They Carried, Lieutenant Jimmy Cross is a man who is in two forms of war, one that is in Vietnam, and one that is mental. Lieutenant Cross carried many things while in war. Lieutenant Cross did not just carry equipment, he also “carried the common secret of cowardice barley restrained, the instinct to run or freeze or hide, and in many respects this was the heaviest burden of all, for it could never be put down, it required perfect balance and posture” (O’Brien, 1198). Throughout this story, various scenes show what could be a temporary change in Lieutenant Cross. In The Things They Carried, Lieutenant Cross made himself a “cowardice” (O’Brien, 1198) escape from the Vietnam war; however, one can soon see that Cross attempts to become a better Lieutenant and realizes that he is required to make a “perfect balance” (O’Brien, 1198) between his mind and his actually duty.

1968: The year Tim O’Brien was sent to Vietnam. We can only imagine what it might feel like to face it: being so young, having so much ahead and being sent to some place, which might be the end. Definitely scary. An absolutely new absorbing environment, new companions, new you. I guess, “scary is the new black” in a green recruits life.