Liam O Flaherty's The Sniper

In the short story “The Sniper,” author Liam O’Flaherty deals with a conflict that still has divided ireland since the civil war ended, showing few signs of lessening. The fighting takes place in the heart of Dublin, Ireland, after sundown. The Irish Republican Army is engaged in a civil war with the Free State. The youthful main character, the Republican sniper, has been affected by the war and is now a fanatical looking soldier, forced by warfare to grow up too fast. The sniper needs to operate as a seasoned warrior in order to live. If he fails to develop as a cunning fighter, he will not survive. “The Sniper” emphasizes a profound irony of civil war: A brother is pitted against his own brother---who, ironically, is poised to kill the republican

sniper if given the opportunity. The Republican sniper outwits the Free Stater into being careless, and this carelessness costs the Free Stater his life. “The Sniper”shows several of the worst horrors of war: War makes life seem cheap and worthless. The story also shows us that in war, carelessness leads to certain death. Yet in the end, the story shows the absurdity and futility of fighting against individual human beings.

War makes life seem cheap by reducing human beings to mere objects.

Soldiers shoot at the enemy, not individual people. Enemy targets don’t have names or faces, so they aren’t considered valuable human beings. They are nothing more than objects to be shot at from a distance. To support this O’Flaherty refrains from naming any of his characters. For example, in the story the author introduces our IRA sniper protagonist without ever mentioning the character’s name. O’Flaherty writes, On a rooftop...a republican sniper lay watching.”(p.8) for the rest of the story only the pronouns of he, him,and his refer to the protagonist. The antagonist, a Free State enemy soldier on an opposite rooftop is indirectly mention when the writer narrates, “...a bullet whizzed over his head...it came from the opposite side of the street.” (p.9) Even when we learn that enemy sniper just killed is our protagonist’s brother, this character still is not named. Furthermore, a lady killed on the street is only referred to as’... an woman, her head covered by a tattered shawl.” (p.9) She never gets specifically named, expect the readers are told that she is an informant. The author purposely avoids naming the characters to show us that in war people’s lives are not worthy of consideration. This is important to understand because the author is illustrating that the enemy will always shoot to kill without considering people as

individuals.

Furthermore the story shows us that in war, carelessness and relaxed security leads to certain death. The sniper security was let down when he ate a sandwich, drank whiskey, and smoked a cigarette. The narrator stated placing a cigarette between his lipses struck a match inhaled smoke and immediately a bullet hit itself against the parapet of the roof.(p.9) Another way the sniper off guard was a lady. The sniper lost his guard from the lady because he was watching her surrounding for she didn’t get shot. “Suddenly from the opposite roof a shot range out and the sniper dropped his ritie with a curse.”(p.9) The last thing was that the other sniper let his guard down. He let it down because he thought he killed the sniper popped out with his revolver and shot the other sniper.

Third part of the story shows the absurdity and futility of fighting against individual human beings, as war knows no boundaries. It does not discriminate on age, gender, family ties, location, or even the time of day. This is saying that in war you really don’t know who you’re gonna kill, or who’s gonna kill you. Like so the narrator said “The woman whirled round and fell with a shriek into the gutter.” (p.9) a woman was walking down the street and the sniper shot and killed. Another thing is that the narrator stated, “The revolver went off with the concussion and the bullet whizzed past the sniper’s head.” P.11 so basically he shot randomly. Finally when he killed the sniper he wanted to check if he knew the person. While he was going to check the body a enemy vehicle was shooting. Since he was getting shot he had to run across and leap into cover with the dead body. When he turned the body over and turns out to be his… brother.

As I have stated in paragraph 2 was that people let their guard down like the sniper was drinking whiskey, eating a sandwich, and smoking a cigarette because of that he was getting shot from the sniper. In paragraph 3 talks about that age, gender, family ties, location, or even time of day. This was saying that in war you really don’t know who you’re gonna kill like the sniper killed the other sniper (his brother). When the sniper went to go see the body he found out it was his brother. The universal truth is that you really don’t think about anything else besides staying alive so you’ll do anything to stay alive even kill someone you know.