In 'The Sniper'; Liam O' Flaherty suggest the horror of war not only by presenting its physical dangers but also by showing its psychological effects. The story takes place in Dublin around the beleaguered Four Courts in the middle of the city where gunfire of heavy guns, machine guns, and rifles break the silence around the sniper because of a civil war that is especially dangerous because the enemy looked similar to yourself. The sniper is on the roof in a vulnerable situation because there is no cover, no place to hide. Besides that it's June around the twilight hour when it is fading into night and when the smallest amount of light attracted attention to the enemy.
The bullets fired also make the danger of the sniper's location clear. When he lights his cigarette, almost immediately a bullet is shot against the parapet of the roof. Just as he raised his himself cautiously over the railing of the roof another bullet whizzed by him, just missing his head. Soon he sees a tank commander and a women informer pointing out his location on the roof, he first takes out the tank commander, followed by the old lady that is giving the information. Suddenly from the opposite side there is a flutter of bullets that come from the opposite side of the street.
The psychological effects on the sniper suggest the horror of war. The sniper's feeling of excitement shows a lack of concern for other people. The sniper's fanaticism is known when it mentioned that he had not eaten because he was so excited to be there. Although when the armored car pulled up, the very sound of the engine and the color of the 'gray monster'; stuck fear in his heart. When the sniper was aiming at the other sniper his hand trembled with eagerness, proving his lack of concern for others. When he finally shot, he uttered a shout of joy releasing his 'lust for battle';.
Finally the horror of the war is made clear because the sniper can only think of other people as the enemy. Before he lights his cigarette he wonders if the 'enemy'; is watching.
In the story, “The Sniper”, The sniper showed that he was an intelligent soldier. In the beginning, after Being shot by the enemy sniper the sniper took care of his wound and was able to compose himself and think of a plan. Thinking he had won the battle after the snipers successful decoy the enemy sniper dropped his guard and the second he did the sniper
In Liam O'Flaherty s The Sniper, all of these are brought to an acute reality in a single war-torn city. Strong cerebral convictions and opposing philosophies, which people want to destroy. The Sniper How does the author depict the turmoil and plight in a war-torn city? in “The Sniper”? Anger, pain, death and remorse- all unpleasant, but all are faced and. handled in every war.
Murder is a reprobate action that is an inevitable part of war. It forces humans into immoral acts, which can manifest in the forms such as shooting or close combat. The life of a soldier is ultimately decided from the killer, whether or not he follows through with his actions. In the short stories The Sniper by Liam O'Flaherty and Just Lather, That's All by Hernando Téllez, the killer must decide the fate of their victims under circumstantial constraints. The two story explore the difference between killing at a close proximity compared to killing at a distance, and how they affect the killer's final decision.
His quick thinking and desperate attempts to avoid an intricate situation ends with him killing his enemy, but the consequence is later revealed at the end of the short story. O’Flaherty writes, “Then the sniper turned over the dead body and looked into his brother’s face” (4). In other words, the enemy that the Republican sniper shoots at the end of the passage was not only his enemy, but his brother. The action of killing his brother shows that the Republican sniper is to blame because he takes action, without much thought, and does not consider that he is shooting his own flesh and blood. The Free Stater sniper is utterly the same as the Republican sniper because he views his enemy the exact same way. He does not ruminate on whether his enemy lives a different life outside of the war. Another sentence that is prominent in showing the mindset of the snipers wanting to create bloodshed from each other is, “ He must kill that enemy…” (3). O’Flaherty writes this to showcase the Republican sniper’s thoughts and feelings through his elaborate plan to assassinate the opposing sniper. The Republican sniper merely deliberates on how he will eliminate his
As we saw earlier, both authors of both stories were born in different places and did many things. “The Sniper” sets in Dublin, Ireland, during a time of a bitter civil war. It was a war between the Republicans, which wanted Ireland to become ...
In the story “The sniper”, the sniper face an external conflict and an internal conflict. His external conflict was the enemy sniper. He saw an old woman heading towards the man in the turret. The old woman was pointing at the sniper. Sniper thought
While on this mission, when confronted with a traumatic event, instead of a typical reaction like crying, the men would resort to violence to express their pain. For example, when Curt Lemon, Rat Kiley’s best friend, stepped on a mine and was killed, Rat took his agony and suffering out on a water buffalo, slowly and painfully destroying the animal’s life. Rat’s reaction shows that the war itself had begun to consume him and finally did when he was forced to shoot himself in the foot because he could not deal with the aimless hiking anymore.... ... middle of paper ...
As a socialistic society we live in we find ourselves in positions were conflicts arise between friends or family. 'The Sniper'; was written by Liam O ' Flaherty to express a subtle yet powerful opinion on such a conflict. With references this essay will analyse the short story bringing to light the structure used to contribute to the theme.
The mood of the story is dark and weary. In this scene the sky is gloomy and there are Republican and Free Starter soldiers fighting in the Irish Civil war, “The long June twilight faded into the night. Dublin lay enveloped in darkness but for the dim light of the moon that shone through the fleecy clouds.. machine guns and rifles broke the silence of the night, spasmodically” (O’Flaherty 1). Although the mood of the story is creepy and dim for the most part, it is silent with the sudden sounds of guns firing. As the story progresses, the sniper’s emotions begin reflecting on his actions. He begins to feel guilt and remorse for killing someone and the mood shifts to tension and violence.
The theme of The Sniper was the civil war and how war can destroy a man both in body and mind for the rest of his life. Liam O’Flaherty suggests the horror of war not only by presenting its physical dangers, but also by showing its psychological effects. We are left to wonder which has the longer lasting effect-the visible physical scars or the ones on the inside? The theme of The Most Dangerous Game was hunter hunted and shows the author's point of view on how one who has intellect can overcome one who has intelligence or instinct. The two stories are similar in showing that even under pressure a man can use his reasoning to keep him alive.
Birdy, who is a new soldier, fears that he will end up dead during the war. He said,“Then I realized that it was the noise, the constant booming, that just filled my guts with a trembling sensation. I knew if I heard the boom I was safe because whatever had exploded hadn't hit me. But it was the idea that at any moment it could be all over, that I could be dead or lie in the sand twisting in agony, that filled me with a terror that I hadn't known before. Terror. It wasn't just being scared. It was a feeling that was taking me over. I knew it but I hoped no one else saw it,” (Myers 71). This description of Birdy's fear develops the idea that in Iraq, surviving emotionally during the war is important to be alive. Walter Dean Myers wants the reader
In “The Sniper” the conflict is man vs man, which means main character is tasked with killing his enemy, but it proves to be quite a challenge. Even though there were many challenges the sniper followed through with his job and persevered even after he was shot in the arm. Wanting to kill his enemy, stay alive, and be one step closer to ending the war was his main goals. Being brave, he took off his hat, placed it on his gun, and raised it above the edge of the roof. Instantly the enemy shot at it and the sniper, pretending to be dead, waited until the enemy got up for him to shoot him. He did some quick thinking and, with determination, handled the conflict quite well.
By contrast, the Sniper also possesses many traits of an amateur soldier. He is described as having “the face of a student”, and had been fasting because “he was too excited to eat”. The word “student” has the connotation of one who is young, inexperienced, and still learning, while his excitement implies that this fighting was new to him, because most people tend to be excited at new experiences. Furthermore, when passage states that as he heard the enemy car draw nearer “his heart beat faster”, which is another portrayal of his eagerness and desire to fight. Thus we see a disparity in the Sniper’s character, which is both experienced and amateur.
Usually when someone is murdered, people expect the murderer to feel culpable. This though, is not the case in war. When in war, a soldier is taught that the enemy deserves to die, for no other reason than that they are the nation’s enemy. When Tim O’Brien kills a man during the Vietnam War, he is shocked that the man is not the buff, wicked, and terrifying enemy he was expecting. This realization overwhelms him in guilt. O’Brien’s guilt has him so fixated on the life of his victim that his own presence in the story—as protagonist and narrator—fades to the black. Since he doesn’t use the first person to explain his guilt and confusion, he negotiates his feelings by operating in fantasy—by imagining an entire life for his victim, from his boyhood and his family to his feeling about the war and about the Americans. In The Man I Killed, Tim O’Brien explores the truth of The Vietnam War by vividly describing the dead body and the imagined life of the man he has killed to question the morality of killing in a war that seems to have no point to him.
The setting to “The Sniper” plays a vital role in understanding the meaning O’Flaherty was trying to convey. The main character is sitting on a rooftop near O’Connell Bridge in Dublin Ireland. During the Irish Civil War, the river that flowed beneath the bridge, was the dividing line in the Battle of Dublin. From the beginning, when civilians watched the opening attacks from atop the bridge, to the end, when it shook from the final bombing that forced the Republicans to surrender, the bridge was a key factor to the end result of the war. (Black,