The Things They Carried By Tim O ' Brien

With this in mind, O’Brien describes many equipment the soldiers carry to the Vietnam War, such as weapons, sentimental items, food and most significant; their “emotional baggage”. He states that “They carried the shameful memories. They carried the common secret cowardice barely restrained, the instinct to run or freeze or hide… this was

Imagine one day you receive a mail from the government that you been draft to go a war at a different country. How would you feel if you know that purpose of this war is unreasonable in any senses? Angry, anxious or even confused. Vietnam War was “a personal failure on a national scale” (Hochgesang). There are many videos, documents and movies about the Vietnam War that show different angles of the Vietnam veterans’ experience and how the war really changes their life. In “The Things They Carried” written by Tim O’Brien, he argues about how the Vietnam War affect the soldiers in many ways, not only physically, but more important is the psychological effects before, during and after the war.

The Vietnam War was a long conflict lasting between 1955 to 1975 between the communist North and the democratic south with help from the United States. More than 3 million people, including 58,000 American troops were killed in the conflict. Tim O 'brien 's short story “The Things They Carried” follows a platoon named alpha company during the peak of the Vietnam war led by first lieutenant Jimmy Cross who is very charismatic but in his mind he is unsure how to lead his squad because his mind tends to wander to a thought of a girl back home. Throughout the story he has overcome with emotions and guilt because he believes he his the reason for some of his squadmates death. “The Things They Carried” Embodies the hardship, reality, and price/toll of war, ultimately Tim O’brien writes this masterpiece as not of a war story, but as a love story and how that love changed a man.

In life, everyone has obligations. People have responsibilities they have to tend to everyday, but sometimes there are passions of love or revenge that makes one stop thinking of what their true responsibilities are. For soldiers fighting in war, their responsibility is to take care of their men and make sure no one gets hurt. They fight for their country and protect the men who have become their family. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross went against his honor to protect his men. He let his responsibly go, which caused one of the men in his group to die. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross confronts the demands of the love for Martha, which conflicts with his responsibility in the war, which affects him and the story.

The short story “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien used many different types of literary devices. Imagery is used to illustrate the war in a descriptive way. Figurative and literal language is used to describe the things that the soldiers carried with them; physically and emotionally. Some of the things that the soldiers carried with them were symbols of luck. Personification was used when mentioning these good lucks symbols and it was also used to describe the dead. Alliteration was used in the short story to emphasize the sound of how fast life could end while being at war.

In the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, Tim O’Brien explains the different events both he and his fellow comrades soldiers experienced in the Vietnam War. Tim retells the stories of his own traumatic events as well as stories he has heard from his friends. Some stories affect the soldiers greatly while other stories do not affect them as much. The character Norman Bowker from Tim O’Brien’s novel demonstrates the four main symptoms of post traumatic stress disorder. Post traumatic stress disorder, also known as PTSD, “is a mental health condition that 's triggered by a terrifying event — either experiencing it or witnessing it” (“Post-traumatic stress disorder” Mayo Clinic). The four main symptoms of post

The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien, transports the reader into the minds of veterans of the Vietnam conflict. The Vietnam War dramatically changed Tim O’Brien and his comrades, making their return home a turbulent and difficult transition. The study, titled, The War at Home: Effects of Vietnam-Era Military Service on Post-War Household Stability, uses the draft lottery as a “natural experiment” on the general male population. The purpose of the NBER (National Bureau of Economic Research) study is to determine the psychological effects of the Vietnam War on its veterans. In order to do this, they tested four conditions, marital stability, residential stability, housing tenure, and extended family living. However, it

The central theme and true meaning of courage is shown vividly in numerous instances throughout Tim O’Brien’s classic novel The Things They Carried. O’Brien’s novel begins with the courage of coming of age, along with the author’s loss of his innocence. Tim, the protagonist of this novel, goes through an incredible change in belief when he must choose to either run away from the Vietnam War or unwillingly join the bloody battle, of which he strongly did not have faith in. The main courageous occurrence that O’Brien was showing the reader was the fear of going to war, and the integrity behind holding ones beliefs and morals in fighting for their country. The Things They Carried shows

In the story The Things They Carried Tim O’Brien didn’t mention anything about traditional war heroes. I think this was a great idea, because there are no traditional war heroes. A traditional war hero is someone who is fearless and someone who can’t be harmed mentally or emotionally. But in The Things They Carried the soldiers out on the front lines were emotionally and physically scarred. Tim O’Brien didn’t write about traditional war heroes, O’Brien wrote about normal people, people with different views on the Vietnam war, and how the war affected these people.

Every one of us has experienced a strong emotional fear, and in that moment of stress, we learn more about who we are. The short story “The Things They Carried”, by Tim O’Brien, follows the lives of soldiers trying to survive the emotional and physical stresses of the Vietnam War. Throughout the story, O’Brien juxtaposes the physical weight of the supplies that the soldiers must carry with the immeasurable weight of their intense emotional experiences. The theme of “The Things They Carried” is the burden of fear, which O’Brien portrays through the counter-weight of objects the soldiers cling to for consolation and escape. Some men turn to objects that remind them of love, no matter how unlikely it is that they are loved back. Other men

Death defines life; it has the ability to reinvent the living for better or worse. “The Things They Carried”, by Tim O’Brien, provides a non-linear, semi-fictitious account of the Vietnam War that poignantly depicts the complicated relationship between life and death. His account breathes subtle vitality and realism into the lingering presence of the dead, intimating that the memories they impart have as profound an impact as the living.

In "The Things They Carried," O'Brien made reference to the Vietnam war that was closely associated with the physical, psychological, and emotional weight the soldiers beared.  The overall method of presentation of this story incorporated many different outlooks on the things the soldiers carried, dealt with, and were forced to adapt to.  In addition to this, O'Brien showed us the many reasons why and how the soldiers posessed these things individually and collectively and how they were associated directly and indirectly.  The strong historical content in "The Things They Carried" helped emphasize the focus of the story and establish a clearer understanding of details in the

Trouble without a doubt is what First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried around his shoulders because he was out in war, where mistakes happen. Lost and unknown of his surroundings he had to lead his men into safety, while destroying anything they found. First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross only holds onto one thing for hope and that is Martha, the woman who he hopes is a virgin to come back to. Tim O’ Brien introduces symbolism by adding a character that has a meaning of purity and a pebble, which symbolizes a meaning of separate but together. In the story, “The Things They Carried”, Tim O’ Brien clearly organizes every detail and puts it into perspective, like how he mentions the soldiers carrying things that comfort them. One person he mentions in the story is Martha. He is very curious to find out if she is a virgin or not. The obsession of virginity means he wanted something pure to come back from battle. Usually someone who is out in war comes back with Post traumatic stress or with other problems and want something pure to help them forget the horrifying images of war. Holding on to that hope of Martha is probably the only thing that is keeping First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross from dying or giving up. There are many themes in the story, which are, memory, death, and storytelling, each of these themes play a huge part and so does the symbolism.

During the Vietnam War, a range of emotions occurred within every soldier. Even though some veterans can move past their memories of war, many soldiers became haunted by their dark memories. In Tim O’Brien’s fictional novel The Things They Carried, O’Brien takes his readers through several different events and emotions that occurs to his character during the Vietnam War. Although his character sometimes faces a tough time telling the story, O’Brien manages to inform his readers of the different emotions he faced from the point he enter the Vietnam War to the end of the Vietnam War. During the novel, several different themes continuously appear throughout the text. Out of all the themes that O’Brien describes, the themes of guilt and fear stand out the most during his stories of before, during, and after the war.

SOLDIER! Grab a helmet and buckle up immediately there is no more room for fatuous behavior because it is a matter of life and death. Soldier, adhere to this warning: the draft brings young men into the action of war but the wretched war surely chews them up and spits them back out as a diabolic mutant grieved with woes. A former marine, Tim O’Brien, wrote The Things They Carried in order to demonstrate this aforementioned warning as well the cryptic reality of Vietnam. By implementing a cataloging technique, O’Brien truly brings the horrifying stories of Vietnam to life further roping in his readers so much that they feel themselves carrying the characters burdens of the Alpha Company. Ultimately O’Brien’s book The Things They Carried,