COMPARE AND CONTRAST EXPERIENCES OF IRAQ & VIETNAM: Thousands were killed, and many more were wounded in the Vietnam war, a war that many are to this day still living with the consequences. The Things They Carried, written by William Timothy O'Brien. The story takes place in Vietnam, during the war, sometime in the 1960s. First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, and his unit are in Vietnam serving for the United States. Jimmy, is in love with a college woman named Martha from back home. Martha writes Jimmy many letters about school, rarely mentioning the war. This is the story of group of soldiers in the war, and the things they carry. The men not only carry physical necessities for war, but also the emotional and psychological weight as well. The unit was set with a task of "searching and destroying elaborate tunnel complexes, in the Than Khe area of south of Chu Lai" (O'Brien 100). Nearly seconds after the soldier came out of the tunnel, s U.S. solider, Ted Lavender, was shot and killed while returning to the rest of unit from relieving himself. Jimmy Cross was in a trans-like state while the man was in the tunnel, thinking about Martha. Soldiers describe the event as "boom-down" (O'Brien 102), indicating the way Ted Lavender hit the ground. Jimmy Cross felt horrible about Ted's death thus adding another thing for him to carry, the guilt of losing one of his soldiers. While all of the soldiers carried things, this story gives an awareness of not only the physical facet of war, but the emotional side equally. That is to say that both post traumatic stress disorder and physical disabilities are issues that many soldiers have to deal with once they return home from war. Mental affects on veterans can vary person to person. Events l... ... middle of paper ... ...unteering to serve their country and fight in the Afghanistan war. Even though, a number people are against the war, there are a great deal of citizens that support and appreciate the soldiers that are fighting for America. However, it seems to be that the Iraq/Afghanistan veterans are getting more support of their time served, compared to those that served in Vietnam. CONCLUSION: To conclude both the Vietnam and the war against Afghanistan have their similarities. In both instances, there are people who do not support either war for various reasons. In both Vietnam and Afghanistan, the veterans in general suffer the same ramifications of war. Some are physically injured for life, others may be emotionally and psychologically disturbed. There are many organizations that are set up to help veterans get the necessary help to readjust to a normal civilian lifestyle.
‘The Things They Carried’ by Tim O’Brien provides a insider’s view of war and its distractions, both externally in dealing with combat and internally dealing with the reality of war and its effect on each solder. The story, while set in Vietnam, is as relevant today with the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan as it was in the 1960’s and 1970’s in Southeast Asia. With over one million soldiers having completed anywhere from one to three tours in combat in the last 10 years, the real conflict might just be inside the soldier. O’Brien reflects this in his writing technique, using a blend of fiction and autobiographical facts to present a series of short narratives about a small unit of soldiers. While a war story, it is also an unrequited love story too, opening with Jimmy Cross holding letters from a girl he hoped would fall in love with him. (O’Brien 1990).
ccording to the 1990 Veterans organization report, one in every three Vietnam veterans that were in heavy combat suffers from post-traumatic stress; this includes thirty-three percent of soldiers who went to Vietnam, or nearly one million troops, who gave into post-traumatic stress. PTSD must have been common in the group of soldiers in Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried” due to the amount of burdens each soldier carried. Throughout the story, O’Brien demonstrates theme of psychological, physical and mental burdens carried by every soldier. He emphasizes these burdens by discussing the weight that the soldiers carry; their psychological and mental stress they have to undertake as each of them experience the brutality of the Vietnam War. The physical burden that each soldier carried was a necessity for them due to their emotional burdens that they carried.
One of the most overlooked aspects in the life of a soldier is the weight of the things they carry. In Tim O'Brien's story, "The Things They Carried," O'Brien details the plight of Vietnam soldiers along with how they shoulder the numerous burdens placed upon them. Literally, the heavy supplies weigh down each soldier -- but the physical load imposed on each soldier symbolizes the psychological baggage a soldier carries during war. Though O'Brien lists the things each soldier carries, the focal point centers around the leader, Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, and his roles in the war. Lt. Cross has multiple burdens, but his emotional baggage is the most pressing. Of all the weights burdened upon Lt. Cross, the heaviest baggage is located in his own mind. Specifically, the heaviest things Lt. Cross carries are an emotional obsession over Martha's love, the physical consequences caused by his daydreaming of Martha, and an unrelenting guilt about Ted Lavender's death.
...g exclusively on the war and men of whom he is in charge of. It ends up taking the death of one of his men, Ted Lavender, for Jimmy to realize that he needed to get his priorities straight; which included, being the leader that his troops deserved. In conclusion, Jimmy’s character traits changed immensely, from several negative traits in the beginning, to ample positive traits in the end. Jimmy took on his responsibility as the First Lieutenant, and began taking the necessary steps to bettering himself, along with his troops.
I wonder what it was like to witness the Vietnam War firsthand in combat. Well, in the short story, “The Things they Carried,” by Tim O’Brien, the theme was portrayed as the physical and emotional burdens that soldiers had to deal with during the Vietnam War.
The novel, “The Things They Carried”, is about the experiences of Tim O’Brian and his fellow platoon members during their time fighting in the Vietnam War. They face much adversity that can only be encountered in the horrors of fighting a war. The men experience death of friends, civilians, enemies and at points loss of their rationale. In turn, the soldiers use a spectrum of methods to cope with the hardships of war, dark humor, daydreaming, and violent actions all allow an escape from the horrors of Vietnam that they experience most days.
The Things They Carried is a collection of stories about the Vietnam War, but in reality, the book centers around the relationships the men make, their connections to the world they left behind and the connections that they formed to Vietnam. The stories are not war stories, but stories about love, respect and the bonds made between men when they spend day after day fighting just to stay alive.
For example, one such similar war is World War I. The soldiers in World War I faced many dangers similar to the dangers faced by Vietnam War soldiers. Friends dying in front of them, bombs exploding in their faces, land mines, bullets whizzing by their heads, exhaustion
Tim O’Brien wrote the novel The Things They Carried in 1990, twenty years after the war in Vietnam.In the novel,Obrien takes us through the life of many soliders by telling stories that do not go in chronical order. In doing so we get to see the physical and mental things the soldiers carry throughout the war in Vietnam.Yet the novel is more than just a description of a particular war. In the things they carried Tim O’Brien develops the characters in the book slowly, to show the gradual effect war has on a person. O’Brien shows this by exploring the life of Henry Dobbins, and Norman Bowker.
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien offers readers very unique and interesting view of the Vietnam War and the mentality of a soldier.
Literary Analysis Essay on The Things They Carried The book The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien is fiction and truth wound together to create a frustrating and addicting novel of fiction about the Vietnam war. O’Brien created stories by using his experiences during the Vietnam whether they are true stories or not is an unattainable knowledge for the reader, the only person of that knowledge is only O 'Brien himself. Through his writing he emphasized the the fact that you cannot perfectly recall the experiences of your past when your telling a story but the way it is told is “true sometime than the happening-truth(O’Brien 171) which helps give The Things They Carried depth beyond that of a “true”, true story. O’Brien has many characters in his book, some change throughout the book and others +are introduced briefly and change dramatically during their time in war and the transition to back home after the war.
Sherman Alexie once said, “When it comes to death, we know that laughter and tears are pretty much the same thing.” When humans are faced with struggle, he or she has two options: to cope with what they are faced with or to fall prey to the struggle. In the story, “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien, the author narrates the experiences the soldiers of the Alpha Company as they traverse through the fields of Vietnam during the Vietnam War. War is traumatic, and it often changes people permanently. The soldiers deal with emotional, mental, and physical trauma more than most people ever have to endure. They encountered death, disease, and destruction on a weekly basis. The men deal with the uncertainty, fear, and death around them in surprisingly tender, humorous, or horrifyingly brutal ways in order to cope with what they have seen. When faced with war, each man reacts in his own way and changes based on the circumstances he stumbles upon.
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.
Have you ever felt alone or like no one even wanted to be near you? Well, Vietnam Veterans never had a “Welcome Home” like the Veterans of World War 2 who were treated like heroes and got paraded around. They were disrespected and looked down upon for their part in Vietnam. They were treated like the Vietnam War was their idea and they represent those ideas or their commander’s decision instead of it being the government’s fault or their commander’s.
I am a daughter of a Veteran. My dad served as a Marine in the United States Marine Corp from 1962- 1966. During that time, he served in combat during the Vietnam War. My dad was proud to have served for the country he loved so much. This would cost thousands of Americans their life. For those fortunate enough to return home after the war, the war was far from over. Many of these service men and women dealt with several health-related problems due to the chemicals that the government sprayed in Vietnam. In most cases these problem did not surface until many years later. It would take serval years for Veteran to receive any benefits from the Government.