Physical And Emotional Burdens Haunt Everybody And Tim O ' Brien

1185 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Essay the impact of war on literature and society

Justin Jeziorski
Mr. Schroll
Modern Literature
20 April 2015

Physical and emotional burdens haunt everybody and Tim O’Brien gives readers a chance to feel and comprehend the burdens of those who experience war in The Things They Carried. Tim O’Brien puts a distinctive spin on his novel as he uses his experience and knowledge of the war into a historical fiction that has readers engaged from start to finish. Readers can easily determine common themes seen throughout the novel; however, the theme that is most important depends on each reader. O’Brien attracts a variety of audiences with his fictional war stories as they mention motifs of love, friendship, and the burdens that war brings on these soldiers. Even though, O’Brien’s stories take place in Vietnam, the themes and motifs relate to everybody. The burdens that are mentioned are not only tangible for survival, but also intangibles that shows readers the fears these soldiers feel, and the memories of the people who mean the most to these soldiers.
The characters in O’Brien’s novel are given such tremendous in-depth descriptions that make readers feel like they actually knew them. O’Brien starts the novel by talking about the things soldiers carried during their time in the war. He states the essential items for survival like weaponry, maps, dog tags, lighters, and different articles of clothing; however, he also states personal items for each character. Numerous soldiers carried items to remind them of something important back home. Jimmy Cross, a lieutenant, carried pictures and letters from Martha, who is an English major at Mount Sebastian College. Cross was in love with Martha, even though she did not feel the same way about him. He carried her pictures and letters for ...

... middle of paper ...

... the war. All the tragedy that these soldiers experienced in the war haunted them afterwards and it’s learning to cope that determines how much these experiences affected them. Not only for the ones who experienced war, but for everybody, learning to cope with tragedy and experience is an important life skill that takes time to achieve. Bowker never was able to cope with his experiences as he hanged himself a few years after the war messed up his mindset. In a letter written by Bowker to O’Brien a few months before Bowker’s death, Bowker writes, “What you should do, Tim, is write a story about a guy who feels like he got zapped over in that shithole. A guy who can’t get his act together and just drives around town all day and can’t think of any damn place to go and doesn’t know how to get there anyway. (O’Brien 151).” Bowker blames the war for ruining his life as he

Show More
Related

  • Norman Bowker In Tim O Brien's The Things They Carried

    1018 Words  | 3 Pages

    During the war, he carried a diary that he used to escape from reality. This represented his feminine and thoughtful side. In the war, he learned to how to use guns to kill people. This is something that ordinary teenagers would do, so Bowker lost his innocent childhood as he goes through life and death situations. When Bowker returns home, he has to deal with his experience at the war, and he had to adjust to being a civilian. He tried to communicate with people, but they either ignored him or they just didn’t care about him. This made Bowker like an invisible person because he had no impact on other people. As the story progresses, he gave up communicating with people, so he let go. Bowker experience disconnection lead him to hang himself in a locker room of YMCA in his

    Read More

  • The Burdens of Lt. Jimmy Cross in Tim O'Brien's Story The Things They Carried

    1606 Words  | 4 Pages

    In the first paragraph of the story, Jimmy Cross' rank is noted (First Lieutenant) along with the fact that he "carried letters from a girl named Martha, a junior at Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey" (434). From the outset, the reader sees that Martha plays a pivotal role in his thoughts and actions. The fact that Jimmy Cross "would imagine romantic camping trips into the White Mountains in New Hampshire" after he marched the entire day and dug a foxhole indicates that he thinks often of Martha (434). While these thoughts of a lover back home provide some form of escape for Lt. Cross, they also burden him with the obsessive feelings of unrequited love. ...

    Read More

  • The Things They Carried Rhetorical Analysis Essay

    793 Words  | 2 Pages

    In The Things They Carried, an engaging novel of war, author Tim O’Brien shares the unique warfare experience of the Alpha Company, an assembly of American military men that set off to fight for their country in the gruesome Vietnam War. Within the novel, the author O’Brien uses the character Tim O’Brien to narrate and remark on his own experience as well as the experiences of his fellow soldiers in the Alpha Company. Throughout the story, O’Brien gives the reader a raw perspective of the Alpha Company’s military life in Vietnam. He sheds light on both the tangible and intangible things a soldier must bear as he trudges along the battlefield in hope for freedom from war and bloodshed. As the narrator, O’Brien displayed a broad imagination, retentive memory, and detailed descriptions of his past as well as present situations. 5. The author successfully uses rhetoric devices such as imagery, personification, and repetition of O’Brien to provoke deep thought and allow the reader to see and understand the burden of the war through the eyes of Tim O’Brien and his soldiers.

    Read More

  • The Things They Carried Character Analysis Essay

    1067 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the short story, “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien, each soldier carries many items during times of war and strife, but each necessity differs. This short story depicts what each soldier carries mentally, physically, and emotionally on his shoulders as long, fatiguing weeks wain on during the Vietnam War. Author Tim O’Brien is a Vietnam War veteran, an author, the narrator, and a teacher. The main character, First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, is a Vietnam War soldier who is away at war fighting a mind battle about a woman he left behind in New Jersey because he is sick with love while trying to fulfill his duties as a soldier to keep America free. Tim O’Brien depicts in “The Things They Carried” a troubled man who also shoulders the burden of guilt when he loses one of his men to an ambush.

    Read More

  • Comparing The Identities Between Redeployment And The Things They Carried

    1821 Words  | 4 Pages

    In particular, The Things They Carried depicts this consequence of war through the repetition of phrases such as “they carried” and “they would” to indicate the homogeneity among the soldiers when fighting as a collective. Additionally, it is important to note how prevalently longer sentences are incorporated within the text to suggest the plethora of items they carry in common for the war, as O’Brien elaborates, “They carried M-14s and CAR-15s and Swedish Ks and grease guns and captured AK-47s and Chi-Coms and RPGs…” (7). In this case O’Brien’s inclusion of “and” allows him to extend his sentences in order to convey how uniform the soldier’s identities have become due to the war, as they are now only responsible for carrying their necessary weapons and equipment. Another passage that suggests the soldiers’ uniformity is when O’Brien depicts their lifelessness while marching by claiming, “They marched for the sake of the march. They plodded along slowly, dumbly, leaning forward against the heat, unthinking, all blood and bone, simple grunts…but no volition, no will, because it was automatic,” (15).

    Read More

  • Coping Mechanisms Used for Survival in The Things They Carried

    920 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • The Things They Carried Rhetorical Analysis

    1033 Words  | 3 Pages

    By allowing the reader the "[privilege of] the soldiers experience" (Chattarji) it shows how difficult it is to get rid of the weight as begins to define you and the more it becomes a part of a person the harder it is to remove an aspect of yourself. In his repetition, O'Brien wants to give readers a deeper meaning into the everyday struggles of soldiers. He portrays the ways that soldiers were effected in the war and focused on the burdens that developed. O'Brien highlights how war changes those involved as "[the individual dreams of soldiers rise and fall and] their hopes riddled by disillusionment, their fantasies broken by shrapnel edged realities" (Timmeran). Wartime altered soldier’s perception and caused them to develop these emotional and physical weights that followed them for years. When many solider returned they were now stuck with daily burdens that had started since the day they landed in Vietnam. Constantly, these soldiers endured the long lasting results of participating in the war and unable to escape or forget the weight that they endure. "The Things They Carried" serves as a constant reminder to readers about the true realities of soldiers and the impact of war. How soldiers are not stable as they return home because of these weights that have become a part of them and how simple acts such as carrying around a weapon has now manifested itself into an emotional burden that will not leave. Often the realities of being a soldier are not portrayed accurately but O'Brien attempts to put into perspective what it really is like to go through warfare by drawing on his own experiences as a foot

    Read More

  • O'Brien's Things They Carried Essay: Experiences and Emotions

    1608 Words  | 4 Pages

    Experiences and Emotions in The Things They Carried Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried is not a novel about the Vietnam War. “It is a story about the soldiers and their experiences and emotions that are brought about from the war” (King 182). O'Brien makes several statements about war through these dynamic characters. He shows the violent nature of soldiers under the pressures of war, he makes an effective antiwar statement, and he comments on the reversal of a social deviation into the norm. By skillfully employing the stylistic technique of specific, conscious detail selection and utilizing connotative diction, O'Brien thoroughly and convincingly makes each point.

    Read More

  • Courage and Cowardice in The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien

    918 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the beginning chapter, O’Brien rambles about the items the soldiers carry into battle, ranging from can openers, pocketknives, and mosquito repellent to Kool-Aid, sewing kits, and M-16 assault rifles. Yet, the story is truly about the intangible things the soldiers “carry”: “grief, terror, love, longing. shameful memories (and) the common secret of cowardice” (Harris & O’Brien 21). Most of the soldiers did not know what the overall purpose was of fighting the Vietnamese (Tessein). The young men “carried the soldier’s greatest fear, which was the fear of blushing”.

    Read More

  • Symbolism in Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried

    979 Words  | 2 Pages

    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 character’s psychological burdens.

    Read More

  • The Emotional and Psychological Burdens in 'The Things They Carried'

    803 Words  | 2 Pages

    Tim O’ Brien alternates between narrative and descriptions of the tangible items that they soldiers carry. He remembers seemingly everything that his squad mates were carrying and provides an “emotionless recitation” of the weights of each of the items the soldiers carried into the field. He frequently uses the term “humping” to describe how the soldiers carry their gear; making them appear more uncivilized, like animals. As he switches back to mentioning the intangible items, such as the experiences of his leader Jimmy Cross and his love Martha, the emotional weights of each soldier is felt by the reader. This contrast in style affirms that they soldiers are human and provides emphasis to the weight these intangible objects have on the soldiers.

    Read More

  • Psychoanalytic Perspective In The Things They Carried

    1396 Words  | 3 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • The Things They Carried - Themes

    972 Words  | 2 Pages

    In Tim O’Brien’s novel, The Things They Carried, numerous themes are illustrated by the author. Through the portrayal of a number of characters, Tim O’Brien suggests that to adapt to Vietnam is not always more difficult than to revert back to the lives they once knew. Correspondingly the theme of change is omnipresent throughout the novel, specifically in the depiction of numerous characters.

    Read More

  • Symbolism In 'The Red Convertible'

    1135 Words  | 3 Pages

    The main symbol in “The Things They Carried” is the necessities they carried as well as personal belongings. Each item tells a story that shows the past life on the soldier. Rat Kiley, the medic, carried M&M’s with him at all times. They were not to snack on during breaks. He brought them to provide as a placebo for soldiers who weren’t critically wounded and weren’t going to make it. The candy made some soldiers believe it was a painkiller and actually kept them alive and importantly quiet Ted Lavender’s tranquilizes and dope help reduce his fear. Kiowa carried an illustrated New Testament. For Jimmy it is his letters from Martha, it symbolizes the life that he wishes he could be living back at home with her. However, all of them carried one thing in common, the coward trait, the instinct to run at any given moment. Piedmont-Marton argues in her critical essay, “The things they carry on their bodies creates the illusion of unity and collaboration, but the fragile collective is always compromised by the things they carry inside and by the meanings and emotions attached to the smallest and most private of artifacts” (Para 3). She shows that the things that weigh the most have the least amount of meaning to them. The only thing getting them through times and not putting a bullet in their foot is the weightless mementos they have that give them

    Read More

  • Women and Their Role in The Things They Carried by Tim O'brien

    897 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Things They Carried Women and their Role in The Things They Carried Within the book The Thing’s They Carried, the stories of the male soldiers and their dealings with the Vietnam War. However, he also delves into the stories of the women and how they affected the soldiers and their experiences in Vietnam. While the men dealt with the horrors of war, the women were right at their side, just not in as much of a public view as the male soldiers. O’Brien uses women such as Martha, Linda and Kathleen in The Things They Carried to punctuate how vital remembrance and recompense was to him and other soldiers in Vietnam.

    Read More

More about Physical And Emotional Burdens Haunt Everybody And Tim O ' Brien

Open Document