1. In “The Things They Carried” written by Tim O’ Brien, Tim really goes into full detail about his horrifying adventures in Vietnam. In the war, Tim was very descritptive and he liked to talk about his relationships and friendships with other soldiers. The book overall was very keen on giving the reader a good picture of what was happeing and what was going on, because in the world of”The Things They Carried” it’s so vastly described and may not be as heartworming and colorful as other books are, this one is a real tearjerker. Espessialy when one of Tim’s frriends or just plain and simple someone is put to their eternal rest by a Vietnamese soldier. Wars in general are a very touchy subject… at least for me at least. I never like talking …show more content…
The book is all about American Pride simply because the Americans fought the Viatnamese and they fought for pride and vigilante justice for americans when the Vieatnamese people had attacked. Although nobody won this war. It was truly a day for Americans to show a sign of relief when this whole fiasco was done and over with. The middle east and other parts of 3rd world countries are truly scary places that so many of our fallen soldiers have had the misfourtoiune of going to and eventually falling to their own deaths also when Tim aaddreses later in his writings that he conveys that he had personal confrontations with death itself. Personal and many of his fallen friends had passed and or gotten killed and this iwas all in all just a very tragic, yet heartworming story about how this man dwealt with the hand of cards he was handed. When Tim talks about his personal experiences with his frieends and all of his companion soldiers it just is very tragic. I watched this Public Access tv show once about how things are in 3rd world countries and let me just say that I for one am very pround and relieved to live in the country we do. Even though we are technically spoiled and we have it so much better. We have to take the time to really think about that there are millions of people that are still surving in 3rd world countries, so the way we think about them and the reality are very two different things. Obviously most of the stories we hear are false, but that’s not to say …show more content…
As I stated before, my grandfather was in World War 2 and he really had a lot of things to be responsible for during the war. And pretty much everyone did. So I hear a lot about what your expectations are in war and how to deal with everything and some of the appauling tings that they did. So I can totally relate to these situations from a 3rd person perspective. Being told stories and stories about them from my grandfather is just so interesting and very frieghteing situations he’s been through. And he’s the total opposite from my dad, my dad’s never even shot a gun probably, knowing him no, he’s just a person I would refer to as a “Corporate Slave” someone who works all day and half the night for a big business and he works in a big corporate office at his computer all day, filtering in students for the college he works for. He’s very good at what he does though, I admire him for the serious effort he puts in. and he’s got a very promising position and he works himself tirelessly all the time. Although he does take his anger out on me a lot. And I do get mad, but I always think to myself, he’s doing this because he loves us. And that statement is true. We wouldn’t have the new house we live in right now, we wouldn’t probably have food in our haouse, probably wouldn’t be going to kennedy if he didn’t work. And as for my mom, she works herself too. But yeah, I just wanted to tell of my personal experiences, and I bring family into a lot of this is because family will
This demonstrates that many other troops, in addition to Chris Taylor, changed their moral convictions throughout the war. Tim O’Briens novel, The Things They Carried, emphasizes the concept that there is no mortality in war. The novel is composed of a collection of vignettes about soldiers’ life during the Vietnam War, including their difficulties with love, terror, and death while fighting
For the second half of the reading the narrator is able to hit the last significant and important parts of his story and is able to close the book for the readers. During the first part of the reading O’Brien describes a man who he killed, he goes on to imagine a whole life for the man. I think O’Brien does this because he’s caught in the moment, he feels so guilty and the thought and the physically appearance of the dead man keeps reappearing and stays on the back on his mind. We also learn about when one of the characters, Norman Bowker, goes back home and finds himself almost lost. Even though he is away from the war and time has passed by, all he can think about is the past, including a high school crush, but mostly about the war. This
There are many roads to go down in life, and nobody knows what road to go down until that time has passed and a new time has come. The book The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, was written to explore the purpose of storytelling itself. It is also written in a non chronological order to show and tell the meaning of the story. The best way to tell a true war story is not by putting the story in order, but by telling the meaning of the book even if it does not make sense. Tim O’Brien uses the themes shame/guilt and storytelling/memory to show the feelings and look back on life from the soldiers who fought in the Vietnam War.
Emotions and Burdens – “They carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing – these were intangibles, but they were tangible weight.”(20). O’brien, as well as his platoon members, had to b prepared for death at any given point in time, whether it be his own death or the death of his comrade in arms.
One of the most mysterious characters in the book The Things They Carried is Tim O’Brien. Throughout the book, we see countless of experiences he is forced to go through. From spending time with fellow soldiers to being caught in a mime field, O’Brien has been through a lot! While most of his experiences are pretty straight forward in explaining what happen, there is one experience O’Brien never seems to give a direct description of. This would be whether or not he has killed someone. At one point in the book, O’Brien admits that he has invented some of the stories he has shared, yet he still considers them true. When asked whether or not he had really killed anyone, O’Brien’s response is “I can say, honestly,
Imagine for the rest of your life having to live with the burden of watching not only a fellow soldier, but a friend, die knowing there was nothing you could do about it. The novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien describes the encumbrances that many of the soldiers in the Vietnam War had to face, and remember for their entire life if they survived. The Things They Carried goes into detail about the relentless days they spent in Vietnam at War by telling stories of a platoon that the author was in. These stories explain the life changing burdens soldiers have to carry at war and for their entire lives.
In Tim O’Brien’s novel, The Things They Carried, he uses the theme of relationships and the different forms they take to instruct the reader on how these relationships affect individuals. In O’Brien’s story, he splits his experience in life and the Vietnam War into various sections in order to retell his experiences as well as his fellow platoon members all the while teaching readers various themes and truths about love, life, and war. The tale jumps around from his time before the war, the war itself, and the aftershocks. In life, there are various types of relationships experienced between two beings; this act of bonding between two persons is rather powerful and strange for such a daily occurrence, that other forms are often overlooked. When one thinks of relationships, it is often depicted as two lovers, such as Mark Fossie and Mary Anne Bell who would do anything for a love so pure, but it’s also important to take other forms of relationships into consideration. Tim O’Brien demonstrates this idea in his gripping novel, The Things They Carried, through the different members of the platoon and how they each interact with each other and with themselves; indicating the importance of the relationship with oneself, the sense of comradery between the men, and even political relationships of the countries involved can determine the survival rate of the soldiers involved.
“The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien is a short novel written about the American soldiers in the Vietnam War. The title carries two meanings; duties and equipment for the war and the emotional sorrows the soldiers were put through while at war. O’Brien discussed about the character’s wants and needs and that the constant worry of death was just a few of the emotional baggage they carried. War is never an easy thing to talk about, epically those who were involved. During the Vietnam War, being a soldier wasn’t easy. Soldiers always see death, whether it be another soldier or an enemy. In “The Things They Carried,” Tim O’Brien explores the motivation of solders in the Vietnam War to understand their role in combat, accepting the death
While war stories come and go, there are a selected few that capture the reader’s eyes allowing the book to change form. In Tim O’ Brien’s fictional novel, The Things They Carried, he manipulates the Vietnam War with his own concepts in order to inform the reader of his views. What shows determination more than exaggeration? In in the field, page 109, O’Brien creates Lieutenant Cross as a sympathetic character. His use of hyperbole strengthens Cross’ need to find Kiowa’s body.
The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien is about the war, how some people got drafted to serve their country, which many of them didn’t want. Tim O’Brien tells stories about these people that had to fight in the war and he told it as if he was actually part of the war. When I read his story I felt how he felt; like I was right next to him when it happened and when he lost someone dear to him, I couldn’t help but cry on the inside because I knew that what he went through had to be hard for him. In his two stories, “How to Tell a True War Story”, and “Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong” he tells us about the hard struggles of war but doesn’t want us to believe it.
this well said quote by Marshall McLuhan shows that civilians of America did not and will not know what happened on the battlefields. With the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, this proves just what the Veterans of Vietnam actually went through. With the psychological approach, one can see how PTSD affected many veterans, how loved ones were affected by the war, and how Tim O’Brien changed throughout the war. This proves that the war not only changed the veterans from Vietnam but actually the world around them.
In the book The Things They Carried by, Tim O’Brien portrayed different stories from Vietnam War. Nobody really knows the different things that happen to soldiers in Vietnam. They get paranoid, lose their sense of morality they become angry and frustrated. No one will ever understand the things they are experiencing unless you were in their shoes. In the book there were stories about different historical events and situations the soldiers portrayed. Soldiers who are in the war sometimes do not know the severity and horrors of it all. Some of them have seen and been through a lot. In the war people suffer from physical, mental, and emotional anguish. The one thing they have a hard time doing is coping with it all. There are a lot of issues such
In “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien one is subjected to the in workings of a soldiers mind during the Vietnam War. Although on the surface it may seem just a story of what soldiers carried with them throughout the war, tangible or not, a deeper understanding of what these men faced shines through. As a veteran of the Vietnam war O’Brien has insight that many will never know except through his many writings. His experience throughout the war was seen to shape his stories and “The Things They Carried” is no different. In this story one finds a comparison between the material and immaterial baggage accompanying the soldiers, the soldiers motivation due to their fellow soldier, the uncaring attitude that the war has imparted on the
Written by author Tim O’Brien after his own experience in Vietnam, “The Things They Carried” is a short story that introduces the reader to the experiences of soldiers away at war. O’Brien uses potent metaphors with a third person narrator to shape each character. In doing so, the reader is able to sympathize with the internal and external struggles the men endure. These symbolic comparisons often give even the smallest details great literary weight, due to their dual meanings. The symbolism in “The Things They Carried” guides the reader through the complex development of characters by establishing their humanity during the inhumane circumstance of war, articulating what the men need for emotional and spiritual survival, and by revealing
The short stories “The Red Convertible” and “The Things They Carried” reveal the emotional damage that the veterans of the Vietnam War were affected by. In “The Red Convertible,” the car is a metaphor that embodies the relationship between two brothers, Lyman and Henry, of whom is sent off to the war and came back an unfamiliar person. In “The Things They Carried,” a Lieutenant and his soldiers each carry items that remind them of home and take them away from the war. Similarly, characters from both stories use physical objects as an escape to cope with the effects the war has left upon them. Conversely, the character Henry in “The Red Convertible” succumbs to the reality of the war, whereas Lieutenant Cross in “The Things They Carried,” attempts to relieve himself from what he “carries” and move forward in the war with no distractions. Soldiers of the Vietnam War experience a continuation of emotional distress as a result of their experiences during the war and the effects differ in each person as to whether to succumb to the horrors they experienced or to move forward.