Storytelling has the ability to display the details and and events of war that is not easily depicted in any other way. O’Brien describes the misconceptions and truths that surround the experiences of war and stories about war. O’Brien’s stories are a way of preserving his memories from war, and also a method for soldiers in coping with their situations as well. Stories have the ability to reflect on the grief, struggles, and even satisfying events of war, especially on the front lines of combat. Storytelling is an important way to appeal to emotion and describe important details about the ugly truths that are hidden from the public eye, as well as serving as a coping mechanism in order to deal with one’s life situations.
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objective truths of the war, and fail to understand the emotions and experiences of war because of only receiving knowledge of the objective truth. The famous American writer Walter Dean Myers, who won the Coretta Scott King Award for African-American authors five times and revealed the realistic depiction and language of the Vietnam war, explains how the vital details of war are often covered up: “One of the lessons learned during the Vietnam War was that the depiction of wounded soldiers, of coffins stacked higher than their living guards, had a negative effect on the viewing public.
The military in Iraq specifically banned the photographing of wounded soldiers and coffins, thus sanitizing this terrible and bloody conflict” (Myers). Myers believed that war comes with “wounded soldiers” and “coffins,” and “bloody conflict.” He believed that the many events of war are “covered up” from the public eye. He adds to the idea that many people create their own truths based on their own false perceptions. With this in mind, this adds to the idea that because the war experiences and events are hidden, they can be told through stories to invoke emotion and to conjure up events from the past. Without these stories, no one would know the real events of war and not be able to understand the efforts and struggles of war. Storytelling allows soldiers to give the regular folk back home a first hand experience of what it was like during the war and gives them a better perspective on how they should interpret the war. One can see this when O’Brien describes what a true war story contains: “As a first rule of thumb, therefore, you …show more content…
can tell a true war story by its absolute and uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil” (65). Similarly to Myers, O’Brien relates war with gruesome and evil conflict. In effect, by covering up with the bloody conflicts of war to the public, this is giving them a falsely heightened sense of war and covering the effect it imposes on soldiers. The author explains how the is a war story is uplifting, containing acts of bravery and self-sacrifice, and people are being told a lie. O’Brien also describes his story telling method in more detail in order to clarify his perspective to the reader: "By telling stories, you objectify your own experience. You separate it from yourself. You pin down certain truths. You make up others. You start sometimes with an event that truly happened... and you carry it forward by inventing incidents that did not in fact occur but that nonetheless help to clarify and explain”(158). One see how O’Brien supports his argument of the truth of war when Rat Kiley tortures and slaughters a water buffalo and the death of Curt Lemon in a tree. In the malevolent and crude events of war, story truth is more accurate than the objective truth. Storytelling serves as a healing tool in a stressful time of war.
Laini Taylor, an American young adult fantasy author receiving many awards in American Literature, believes in moving forward in looking at the positives in order to move forward in one’s life: “The biggest challenge for me has been in coping with my perfectionism. I have a stiflingly hard time moving forward in a project if it's not 'just right' all along the way. The trap I so easily fall into is rewriting and rewriting the same scenes over and over to make them perfect, instead of continuing on into the wild unknown of the story” (Taylor). Taylor believes that one should change his or her perspective or actions if they are leading themselves down the wrong path. She also understands that one needs to forget the pain and struggles of the past and work to improve one’s life. This connects with O’Brien’s use of storytelling as a healing component in his deployment in the war. He reveals to the reader that he fell in love with Linda when he was nine years old and how viewed her after her death of a brain tumor: “But this too is true: stories can save us … I keep dreaming Linda alive. The thing about a story is that you dream as you tell it, hoping others might then dream along with you, and in this way memory and imagination and language combine to make spirits in the head”(218). O’Brien continues to keep the memories he had with Linda in his mind as a way to cope with the saddening deaths of his comrades. He
and his fellow soldiers are able to keep an “illusion of aliveness” to ensure their own sanity in light of the amount of death they have to experience. O’Brien tells the reader that this is an important method in dealing with the deaths of their platoon members.
Each day that we live our lives we are faced with the opportunity to believe and tell many stories and dramatizations. As a young child in Hebrew School you were taught that the world was created in six days and on the seventh day God rested. In a Christian home you were told about Saint Nick. On a juvenile level, stories serve a purpose to teach something and to give hope. As adults we continue to tell stories to ease the pain of a subject or to get us through a hard time. A mother that has lost a son in a tragic accident will never be told by the doctor that her son died in pain, but the doctor might say he died peacefully. Tim O'Brien uses storytelling in his book to teach lessons from the war, and to have us understand about the baggage that he and his fellow men had to carry.
O'Brien, Tim. "How to Tell a True War Story." Writing as Re-Vision. Eds. Beth Alvarado and Barbara Cully. Needham Heights, MA: Simon & Schuster Custom Publishing, 1996. 550-8.
In the book Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer wrote about Christopher McCandless, a nature lover in search for independence, in a mysterious and hopeful experience. Even though Krakauer tells us McCandless was going to die from the beginning, he still gave him a chance for survival. As a reader I wanted McCandless to survive. In Into the Wild, Krakauer gave McCandless a unique perspective. He was a smart and unique person that wanted to be completely free from society. Krakauer included comments from people that said McCandless was crazy, and his death was his own mistake. However, Krakauer is able to make him seem like a brave person. The connections between other hikers and himself helped in the explanation of McCandless’s rational actions. Krakauer is able to make McCandless look like a normal person, but unique from this generation. In order for Krakauer to make Christopher McCandless not look like a crazy person, but a special person, I will analyze the persuading style that Krakauer used in Into the Wild that made us believe McCandless was a regular young adult.
The main theory behind such writing is awakening the people back at home, and showing them the seriousness of the situation. Instead of sugar-coating details, or giving just positive accounts of war, it is essential to tell the peopl...
An interesting combination of recalled events and editorial commentary, the story is not set up like a traditional short story. One of the most interesting, and perhaps troubling, aspects of the construction of “How to Tell a True War Story” is O’Brien’s choice to create a fictional, first-person narrator who might just as well be the author himself. Because “How to Tell a True War Story” is told from a first-person perspective and O’Brien is an actual Vietnam veteran, a certain authenticity to this story is added. He, as the “expert” of war leads the reader through the story. Since O’Brien has experienced the actual war from a soldier’s point of view, he should be able to present the truth about war...
In the book “The Things They Carried”, O’Brien uses imagery, figurative language and repetition to convey his message. O’Brien’s purpose for story telling, is to clear his conscience of war and to tell the stories of soldiers who were forgotten by society. Many young men were sent to war, despite opposing it. They believed it was “wrong” to be sent to their deaths. Sadly, no one realizes a person’s significance until they die. Only remembering how they lived rather than acknowledging their existence when they were alive.
The Letter from Birmingham Jail was written by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in April of 1963. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was one of several civil rights activists who were arrested in Birmingham Alabama, after protesting against racial injustices in Alabama. Dr. King wrote this letter in response to a statement titled A Call for Unity, which was published on Good Friday by eight of his fellow clergymen from Alabama. Dr. King uses his letter to eloquently refute the article. In the letter dr. king uses many vivid logos, ethos, and pathos to get his point across. Dr. King writes things in his letter that if any other person even dared to write the people would consider them crazy.
Several stories into the novel, in the section, “How to tell a true war story”, O’Brien begins to warn readers of the lies and exaggerations that may occur when veterans tell war stories.
The truth to any war does not lie in the depths of storytelling but rather it’s embedded in every person involved. According to O’Brien, “A true war story does not depend on that kind of truth. Absolute occurrence is irrelevant. A thing may happen and be a total lie; another thing may not happen and be truer than the truth” (pg. 80). Truths of any war story in my own opinion cannot be fully conveyed or explained through the use of words. Any and all war stories provide specific or certain facts about war but each of them do not and cannot allow the audience to fully grasp the tru...
In conclusion, while books, photos, movies and other historical documentation can portray information or a message about wartime events, they will never be able to produce the feelings of those that were personally involved in wars have experienced. Yet, it is incorrect to criticize these writers. The information they reveal is still very important historical information. Even if a reader or viewer of this media cannot feel exactly the same emotions as those involved, they still often experience an emotional connection to the events being depicted. This is important, not only for the historical knowledge gained about wars, but also to understand the nature and futility of their occurrence.
...often times tragic and can ruin the lives of those who fight. The effects of war can last for years, possibly even for the rest of the soldiers life and can also have an effect on those in the lives of the soldier as well. Soldiers carry the memories of things they saw and did during war with them as they try and regain their former lives once the war is over, which is often a difficult task. O’Brien gives his readers some insight into what goes on in the mind of a soldier during combat and long after coming home.
By incorporating this sense of failure into fictional events, O'Brien is able to communicate the true human emotion behind the story, rather than just the facts. Above and beyond a simple set of war stories, The Things They Carried reduces fiction to the very heart of why stories are told the way they are. Works Cited:.. O'Brien, Tim. A.
Pollan’s article provides a solid base to the conversation, defining what to do in order to eat healthy. Holding this concept of eating healthy, Joe Pinsker in “Why So Many Rich Kids Come to Enjoy the Taste of Healthier Foods” enters into the conversation and questions the connection of difference in families’ income and how healthy children eat (129-132). He argues that how much families earn largely affect how healthy children eat — income is one of the most important factors preventing people from eating healthy (129-132). In his article, Pinsker utilizes a study done by Caitlin Daniel to illustrate that level of income does affect children’s diet (130). In Daniel’s research, among 75 Boston-area parents, those rich families value children’s healthy diet more than food wasted when children refused to accept those healthier but
Throughout Tim O’Brien’s novel, The Things They Carried, a plethora of stories are told concerning the lives of a select number of soldiers in and out of the Vietnam War. In his writing, O’Brien also conveys his own thoughts on the art of storytelling and the nature of stories themselves. In these passages, O’Brien provides a detailed analysis of the challenges of storytelling, the effects of time on memory, the role of imagination in storytelling, the reason for retelling a story, and a story’s purpose and process for the reader.
Jonathan Kozol revealed the early period’s situation of education in American schools in his article Savage Inequalities. It seems like during that period, the inequality existed everywhere and no one had the ability to change it; however, Kozol tried his best to turn around this situation and keep track of all he saw. In the article, he used rhetorical strategies effectively to describe what he saw in that situation, such as pathos, logos and ethos.