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Symbolism in the things they carried short story
Symbolism in "the things they carried" short story
"the things they carried" literary analysis
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Like an executive summary, many novels use the first chapter to introduce the major themes and contents of the work. An example of this technique is Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. In it, O'Brien uses the first chapter, "The Things They Carried," to introduce the characters and the tangible and intangible items they took with them and sometimes burdened over. He uses these possessions to thoroughly define the man carrying it. To these men, even in a war, it is not the machine guns and claymore mines that they prize to maintain their survival but items like pictures and pantyhose that help them remain sane and alive. Each man had his own needs and each man carried his own talisman, all in an effort to remain in the real world. These items eventually became the person carrying it. In this novel, O'Brien's successful portrayal of his war experiences was done by the use of distinguishing key characters and the things they carried to help identify the majorthemes of strength, weakness and confusion.
One of the first characters introduced is Henry Dobbins and because of his greatness in size, the reader assumes he is of great physical strength, lacking emotional potency. Using Dobbins, O'Brien slowly uncovers emotional strength learned through living the war. Dobbins was a "big man, [and] carried extra rations; he was especially fond of canned peaches in heavy syrup over pound cake," (4). This description portrays him as a gentle giant, one who likes to make the most out of life and enjoy the simple necessities life has to offer. His kind personality and friendliness brought him strength within the mind and strength for and from his comrades. In addition, Dobbins carries himself as the calm one, one who can keep his composure ...
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...lot of war veterans, a confusion that illuminates the mind and eventually lead to self-destructing acts. The theme of confusion looms in and out of The Things They Carried as a setback of living the life of war.
O'Brien's choice of character to reflect the novel's major themes was decided by his personal experiences of the war. As a war veteran, during the war there were times when he was strong, times when he was weak, and after the war a time when he was confused. But by writing this novel, O'Brien is able to let out his thoughts, allowing him to objectify his experiences andseparate it from himself. He identifies the major thematic events in his life with various characters in his novel and uses them to discover himself. By including these small introductions in the first chapter, O'Brien provides a road map to the novel which provides blueprints to his life.
O’Brien’s repetition emphasizes how the soldiers carried things emotionally. He uses “They carried” to emphasize the importance of the phrase. He uses “They carried” to emphasize how the soldiers struggled when they were in war. Another form of rhetoric O’Brien uses to aid the reader is his repetition. He tends to begin most of the sentences with “They carried.” In addition to this O’Brien occasionally switches the word carried for other actions: “endured, kept, imagined, crawled, spoke, or did not submit.” This mixture of actions words/phrases, in combination with “they,” allows the reader to view the men in many different dimensions at once. Persistent men, cowardly men, delusional men and etc…. O’Brien adds to the reading experience when he does this and again allows the reader to truly understand the burden of the war through the eyes of the Alpha
O Brien 's point of view is an accurate one as he himself because he is a Vietnam veteran. The title of the short story is meaningful because it describes each soldier’s personality and how he handles conflict within the mind and outside of the body during times of strife. The title fits the life as a soldier perfectly because it shows the reality that war is more than just strategy and attacking of forces. O’Brien narrates the story from two points of view: as the author and the view of the characters. His style keeps the reader informed on both the background of things and the story itself at the same
When O’Brien first arrives to Vietnam, the men of the platoon show him how the grief of war can be covered up by humor. As the men were patrolling near a village off the South China Sea they suddenly started to encounter sniper fire. The firefight only lasted a few minutes but Lt. Cross decided to order an airstrike on the village anyways. After the strike was over, the platoon proceeded to the smoldering village to find nothing but “…an old man who lay face up near a pigpen at the center of the village. His right arm was gone. At his face there were already many flies and gnats.”(). To many, this image of a destroyed village and the mutilated old man would cause horror and plight. Instead of that normal reaction, “Dave Jensen went over and shook the old man’s hand. “How-dee-doo,” he said.”(). The other men of the platoon also went up to the dead man’s body and shook his hand while adding a comment. This disturbing response the men have to the dead old man isn’t one of disrespect, it is their coping mechanism for realizing what they just did. Because O’Brien was new to Vietnam he had yet to understand why the men were all doing this. He was awestruck by the actions...
The theme of emotional weight and its effect on soldiers in the Vietnam conflict is one that O'Brien tackles. By placing physical items next to intangible things like emotions in a list format, O'Brien forces his reader to acknowledge the weight and effect of both of these things on the person who carries them. Lt. Jimmy Cross' inner fear that he was the cause of Ted Lavender's death was symbolized by Martha's pebble and letters. He felt that when he burned the pictures he was conquering his fear, even though no one can simply burn their emotions away. To a certain extent, these men are defined by the things that they carry, "And for all the ambiguities of Vietnam, all the mysteries and unknowns, there was at least the single abiding certainty that they would never be at a loss for things to carry," (O'Brien, 16).
He states that as a soldier, there is so much to soak in from war scenes that it all becomes a muddled mess. Therefore, the story of the moment can be different from each soldier’s perspective due to the parts where each man puts in his own ideas. This leads to some speculation as to whether or not O’Brien’s stories are true or false.
In the essay O'Brien is faced with a conflict, a moral dilemma. He had to decide whether he was either going to go to the war and fight or was he going to run away and avoid the draft. The relationship he had with Berdahl was not of friends or even regular acquaintances. Rather they were perfect strangers. That goes to show you that anyone can be a major influence on your life. Berdahl helped to open O'Brien's heart. He realized who he was and where he had come from, his past and what he has been through. How all the events of the past helped him to become the person he was right now. How his past helped form his personal identity.
"War is hell . . . war is mystery terror and adventure and courage and discovery and despair and . . . war is nasty (80)." When it all happened it was not like "a movie you aren't a hero and all you can do is whimper and wait (211)." O'Brien and the rest of the solders were just ordinary people thrust into extraordinary situations. They needed to tell blatant lies" to "bring the body and soul back together (239)." They needed to eliminate the reality of death. As ordinary people they were not capable of dealing with the engulfing realities of death and war therefore they needed to create coping skills. O'Brien approaches the loss of his childhood friend, Linda, in the same way he approaches the loss of his comrades in the war as this is the only way he knows how to deal with death. A skill he learned, and needed, in the Vietnam War.
The things they carried, by Tim O'Brien. "Oh man, you fuckin' trashed the fucker. You scrambled his sorry self, look at that, you did, you laid him out like fuckin' Shredded Wheat." I chose to start off my essay with this particular extract from the book because I think that it very much represents the story in itself. Azar said this, after Tim (supposedly) killed a Vietnamese soldier with a hand grenade. It shows that in times of war, how callous men can become. However, callousness varies, whether they choose to be apathetic, like Tim shows us after his grenade episode.
Another unique aspect to this book is the constant change in point of view. This change in point of view emphasizes the disorder associated with war. At some points during the book, it is a first person point of view, and at other times it changes to an outside third person point of view. In the first chapter of the book, “The Things They Carried,” O’Brien writes, “The things they carried were largely determined by necessity (2).
The title of the book itself couldn’t be more fitting. The Things They Carried is a semi-autobiographical novel written by Tim O'Brien about soldiers trying to live through the Vietnam War. These men deal with many struggles and hardships. Throughout this essay I will provide insight into three of the the numerous themes seen throughout the novel: burdens, truth, and death.
The idea of love is very complex and can be interpreted in a variety of ways. Both “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien and “Araby” by James Joyce portray the lives of two individuals who are in love. “The Things They Carried” is about a young lieutenant named Jimmy Cross during the Vietnam War. Lieutenant Cross was incapable of focusing on the war because of his constant thoughts of the girl he loved, Martha. “Araby” is about a boy who is infatuated with a girl he has never had a conversation with. Although both protagonists in “The Things They Carried” and “Araby” eventually realize that the girls they loved didn’t feel the same way about them, Lieutenant Cross tried to move on by destroying everything he had that reminded him of Martha, while the boy in “Araby” was left disappointed.
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.
They were essential in showing the key parts in O’Brien’s life that lead to the turning points which lead to the creation of this novel and his ability to be at peace with what had happened in Vietnam. He finally accepted what had happened and embraced it instead of avoiding it. Works Cited Novel O'Brien, Tim.
Overall, the author showed us the courageous and coward s acts of O’Brien the character. The fact that he was a coward made him do a heroic act. O’Brien made the valiant decision to go to war. It would have been easier and cowardly to jump and swim away from all his fears. However he decided to turn back, and fight for something he did not believe in. Thinking about the consequences of running away makes him a hero. He went to war not because he wanted to fight for his country, but for his own freedom. Either choice he could have made would take some kind of courage to carry out. Going to war required some sort of fearlessness. In other words, running away from the law would have been brave; but going to war was even tougher.
They are detached from their own morality and are just fighting on their true instinct. Lastly, storytelling is one of the most prominent themes in the novel. Throughout the entire novel, O’Brien tells his stories of grieving his loss of friends and ultimately getting over the war. He keeps his friends memories alive by telling his recollection of stories in the novel. He writes to keep his innocence alive and to keep the memories of his fellow veterans inside of his mind.