Summary Of The Things They Carried 'By Tim O' Brien

O’Brien “The Things They Carried”

Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, is a remarkable work of fiction with a twist of non-fiction. The stories themselves are fictional, but the people behind them were real, the things they carried with them day to day were real, and most importantly the soldier’s experiences were real. The book gives a good description of what the men actually carried, things such as an M-60 machine gun weighing 23 pounds that was carried by a heavy machine gunner, (O’Brien, 5). On the other hand, it also gives an accurate description of internal pushes and emotions soldiers carried as well. Moreover, the reader can actually see themselves with their boots on the ground in Vietnam, being able to see what the soldiers were feeling and seeing through O’Brien’s description.

The book opens by describing, though a series of short stories, what the soldier carried with them. O’Brien describes that each soldier carried something different, whether it was for the mission at hand, or

something to get them through the day mentally. For most soldiers in the book, it was a mixture of the two. One scenario was Kiowa carrying his grandfathers feathered hatchet, partly for a weapon and partly because it was of important sentiment to him, (O’Brien, 7). On the other hand, there were some who took it too far, one such person was Lieutenant Jimmy Cross. He did this by constantly being infatuated with a girl named Martha, Lieutenant Cross even knows this is a problem but refuses to change. For instance, when lavender dies, Lieutenant Cross breaks down and puts the blame on him for being lost in his own world, thinking about life with Martha, (Obrien, 16). The interesting thing about this was that this girl Martha, did not feel the same way about him and he did about her, and the lieutenant knew this and still remained infatuated. Perhaps this was something that the men carried that helped them forget about where they really were and pretend, if only for a moment, that they were somewhere else. O’Brien makes mention of situations like this multiple times throughout the book, situations where the soldiers would do certain things or hold certain things close to help them live or better yet, survive in Vietnam.
O’Brien continues on talking about stories in current times and gradually moves to telling the stories from the future.

Moreover, the stories continue about Alpha company, which is the company of men being written about in the book. O’Brien talks about the friends he made such as “Rat”, whom he shared many memories with, (O’Brien, 64). He also talks about the differences in death, while it was tragic when someone in the company died, it was a different experience when it was a close friend. For instance, when Kiowa dies, it’s a tragedy for the entire company and many sat around and reminisce about the times they shared, (O’Brien, 163). Therefore, because this story of the Vietnam was it told like a novel, it has a very lifelike feeling to it. When Kiowa died it makes the reader feel the sadness that was in the air, almost as if the reader was present in Vietnam. As I stated earlier, it truly gives people who may not fully understand the tragedy that was

Vietnam.
While reading this book, I felt what the soldiers carried during the war. More than physical items, the things they carried were burdens and emotions that they carried from a previous experience before the war, or something that happened in the war. For instance, back in the beginning when Lavender dies, Lieutenant Cross destroyed and burned the village of Than Khe, almost as if it was revenge for the death of Lavender, (O’Brien, 15). This illustrates some of the reasons for violence and mayhem that occurred during the war on America’s side. Emotionally what the Vietnam War did to American soldiers was more devastating than that of actual physical damage. Many others, such as O’Brien feel the same way, throughout the book the moral remained the same, looking back at the things he had to do and how they affected him then and now. I personally feel that many veterans of the Vietnam war felt the same way.