The Trenches Of Birdsong ( 1993 )

The items the soldiers carry hold a substantial amount of credibility throughout each personal story; however, within O’Brien’s story, he lacks credibility aside from the obvious tangible elements of the items held, questioning where the truth lies within these evidential fragments of the soldiers’ lives. These personal accounts of exact measurements attest the reader’s knowledge of war as well as the mental ability to calculate the exact weight upon each person’s hump through a fiction of mental and emotional agility. O’Brien quotes within Chen’s criticism stating, “A true war story, if truly told, makes the stomach believe” (Chen 77). This background knowledge of O’Brien’s theory that an “absolute occurrence is irrelevant because a true war story does not depend upon that kind of truth,”(Chen 77) places the credibility of the information upon the emotional accounts that O’Brien’s writing bestows upon the personalities of the soldiers. The “academic tone that at times makes the narrative sound like a government report (Kaplan 45),” adds documentation like analysis of these compilations of war endeavors as told by the narrator. Kaplan continues that the “transitional phrases such as “for instance” and “in addition,”’ (Kaplan 45) as well as “whole paragraphs dominated by sentences that begin with “because,”” (Kaplan 45) convince certainty of the

William Dean Howells was an advocate of realism in writing; he believed that literary art should reflect the reality of the common man and demonstrate the truth of everyday current issues. He believed in truthful writing and he accepted very little at face value. He practiced this belief in his own writing, and his story called “Editha” is a good example of this. In this ironic tragedy, W.D. Howells shows the truth and nature of war. He uses a combination of metaphoric characters, irony, and the pathos appeal to create an almost grotesque parody of the reality of war. In final analysis, Howells is successful in highlighting the consequences of war and inspiring the audience to question the wisdom of those who advocate armed conflict.

“The Route of the Crows” by Cemil Kavukcu is a gothic, short story full of symbolism and foreshadowing. “Though the action takes place in and around a house, the house sometimes seems abandoned and sometimes occupied” (“Elements of the Gothic Novel”). The work is pervaded by a “threatening feeling, a fear enhanced by the unknown, and the plot is built around a mystery of an inexplicable event” (“Elements of the Gothic Novel”). Although the narrator and Ziynet are in a constant state of paranoia and assumption, these assertions pave the way to an undeniable fate alluded by the sight of crows.

Gene’s innocence is replaced with apprehensiveness after the realization of the belligerent mentality he has; which was peaked by the images Leper paints of the war. When Finny fell from the tree, Gene didn’t blame himself at first, instead, he said, “...I took a step toward him, and then my knees bent...” (Knowles 83). This shows the very few innocence that almost seems like cluelessness that Gene still has, even when

"At times he regarded the wounded soldiers in an envious way. He conceived persons with torn bodies to be peculiarly happy. He wished that he, too, had a wound, a red badge of courage." (Ch.9, Pg. 61) Jim Conklin, Wilson, and the tattered man are not only alike in some ways, but also have differences. The purpose of this essay is to tell you the similarities between the tall soldier, the loud soldier, and the tattered man, how they are like or unlike Henry Fleming, and what roles these major characters seem to play in the novel.

This book, unlike its predecessor, begins in the thick of things. There is no tearful farewell from the homeland, there is, in fact quite the opposite. While Harrison’s men head toward the harbour that will bring them away from home, McDougall’s men are heading toward a harbour that will lead to their enemy, which they will heroically engage in mortal combat. This heroism is shown exquisitely in “Private Jones’s martyrdom.” (Mason, 95).

The two essays: In a Field of Reason, Lawyers Woo Luck Too by Benjamin Weiser and Embrace the Supernatural by Thornin Klosowski, introduce the importance of superstitions and rituals. These two short stories tell the readers how New York lawyers react to superstitious acts and rituals; also mentioning how the placebos comes into effect. Also, mentioned in these two short stories are helpful and harmful aspects of superstition,

Faulks chooses to explore curiosity as a coping mechanism within ‘Birdsong’ through the character of Stephen. Only curiosity is keeping Stephen alive as he states that he would ‘walk into enemy lines and let (himself) be killed’ if he didn’t possess that curiosity. Stephen tells Weir what he is ‘curious to see what’s going to happen’ suggesting that he wants to see how the War will end. Faulks presents Stephen as a character who has a detached curiosity concerning the War; in the same way that he is detached when discussing men’s dead bodies. Faulks’ decision to do this allows us to understand that many men did not like being in the War; they often did not carry on because they felt it was their duty to King and Country. Rather, they (like the character of Stephen) wanted to know ‘what it means’ and why they had to endure what they did. Stephen’s claim that he is ‘deeply curious to see how much further it can be taken’ quashes false notations of pride in fighting, rather it expresses the horror at what they are being forced to do. Faulks, through Stephen, considers how the War could progress. The war section of ‘Birdsong’ is set half way through the War, meaning that it is still to get worse. Stephen speculates the men

Faulks chooses to focus on the very different relationships between Stephen Wraysford with both Michael Weir and Jack Firebrace. Although the relationships are different they are both forged through the circumstances of war. This is more evident in Wraysford’s relationship with Firebrace in parts two and six, where they are forced together. In comparison Weir and Wraysford are always together apart from when Weir visits home, at which point he tries to explain what the war is like, however he finds that they are not interested and this makes him angry, he wishes that ‘a great bombardment would smash…kill the whole lot of them’. Here Faulks has shown the resentment felt by the men on the front towards the people on the home front because they had no idea what it was like for them and because some of them were not interested or just did not know how to react to the horrors that their family members had been exposed to.

The story “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien is an enormously detailed fictional account of a wartime scenario in which jimmy Cross (the story’s main character) grows as a person, and the emotional and physical baggage of wartime are brought to light. The most obvious and prominent feature of O’Brien’s writing is a repetition of detail. O’brien also passively analyzes the effects of wartime on the underdeveloped psyche by giving the reader close up insight into common tribulations of war, but not in a necessarily expositorial sense.. He takes us into the minds of mere kids as they cope with the unbelievable and under-talked-about effects or rationalizing

Looking beyond Hooper, the soldier’s treatment of Brideshead adds to a sense of carelessness and lack of awareness in the lower classes. The painting that Charles spent hours working on is “made absolute hay of”, Charles created something of wonderful beauty, only to be destroyed by unappreciative men; symbolic for the fate of Britain, in Waugh’s eyes, in the hands of the ‘Youth’.

War forces young soldiers to grow up quickly. In Stephen Crane’s Civil War novel, The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming is no exception. He is faced with the hard reality of war and this forces him to readjust his romantic beliefs about war. Through the novel, the reader can trace the growth and development of Henry through these four stages: (1) romanticizing war and the heroic role each soldier plays, (2) facing the realities of war, (3) lying to himself to maintain his self-importance, and (4) realistic awareness of his abilities and place in life. Through Henry’s experiences in his path to self-discovery, he is strongly affected by events that help shape his ideology of war, death,

Unlike tradition, where there is a clear understanding of a specific belief and its' lack of validity, superstition contains a clear lack of knowledge altogether or perhaps even a dismissal of evidence against an idea, belief or practice that is irrational; most often based on the supernatural. What Michael Cleary did to his wife can be seen as a result of superstition brought on by tradition; the idea that his wife went off with the fairies and that a changeling was in place of her would only be derived from oral tradition of the community and his family. However, it is the lack of knowledge, being the superstitions, in regards to these traditions that lends itself to acting upon them in an irrational manner. At one point Bridget asks her husband as he is questioning her, if he thinks that she went away with the fairies because his Mother did; indicating a history of superstitions regarding fairies. He then goes on to commit the horrendous act, and though one wants to attribute the cause of murder to superstitious acts based on the oral tradition of fairy legends, " superstition just labels it, it does not explain it." (Bourke, 153.)

Strange Meeting and Journey’s End both share similar aspects. Both the texts are set in the First World War and depict in depth what it would be like to be a soldier at the time as well as displaying the endless strife that the soldiers had to endure for four long years. In Journeys End, Sheriff portrays many different emotions through the central character ‘Captain Stanhope’ and similarly in Strange Meeting, Susan Hill does the same with ‘John Hilliard’. In this essay I will compare and contrast the way that both these central characters are presented in the texts.

This energetic imagery makes the reader picture a celebration or carnival; some joyous, benign gathering for independence day, a birthday or maybe the arrival of good news. Yet instead, the church goers celebrate war and cheer for victory over their foe. By creating this celebratory scene, Twain prepares a juxtaposition between the “joy” of victory and the later imagery of the enemy’s slaughter. The contrast between the former and “help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their…” (Twain 2) strikes the reader with great force. This language creates a sense of repulsion, of disgust, that these people could so happily go about the preparation for war, only speaking openly of the triumphs they seek and not the misery they will cause if their prayers are answered.