The Things They Carried Free Response Essay (Prompt 4)
“Telling a True war story”, according author to Tim O`Brien, isn’t a simple telling of any tale as it takes a lot for anyone to believe a true war story. It’s more than any person who hasn’t been a war can tell you. O`Brien’s The Things They Carried, tells of a story where during the communist war between newly involved America and Korea’s Ho Chi Mien, these soldiers or young boys are drafted into the Vietnamese war and experience horrible atrocities that can only be defined by a “true war story” in which involves these soldiers carrying more than just literal objects, but as well figurative weight as in friends deaths, stories of enemies, morals, sins and much more. O’Brien’s idea of
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a “True war story” is defined by a story that needs to make your stomach turn, can’t be generalized, holds deep meanings within already found meanings, must be never ending, have the same effect when passed on for generations to come, and has to be contradictory all while having both a side of truth and fiction. “In a true war story, if there is a moral at all, it’s like the thread that makes the cloth. You can’t tease it out. You can’t extract the meaning without unraveling the deeper meaning.” These words spoken by O`Brien expel his idea of a “true war story” containing meaning of complexity that only can be understood when looking past the first meaning. For example when Rat Kiley takes out his anger on the baby water buffalo because of his lost of his friend Curt Lemon and at first this is the reason why he acts in such an aggressive manner against the buffalo, but on the second time around it seems as if he is looking at the buffalo as himself and punishes himself for not realizing that this is the outcome of a war and continues to firing at his will to try to put it down but cannot break his own will over one dead man so cries and walks away. The truth behind this can be found when looking at the water buffalo as a mirror but the lies and fiction are found in the reality that the water buffalo in not a mirror but in reality a creature that probably is experiencing its own harsh reality. “It comes down to gut instinct. A true war story, if truly told, makes the stomach believe.” In this statement O`Brien tries to get the reader to understand that a “true war story” involves a true loss or an understanding of no war story should have a happy ending. In the story of the water buffalo, it is understood that Rat looses not only his friend Curt Lemon but as well a naïve part of him that prevented the war from getting to his head or keeping him depressed. Rat Kiley`s lost exemplified to the reader that obvious loss should been expected and morality could not always be applied, as Curt Lemon didn’t die some honorable way, his death was a careless mistake made by himself and there’s no way to justify that his death was honorable when he was playing catch and stepped on a land mine. That is war; the simple deaths can happen at any time without any warning at that’s what makes a stomach turn. The truth can be found within the understanding that war is unfair and has no set standard while the fiction is the understanding that war is cruel because a “true war story” is after all just a story not an experience. “The truths are contradictory.
It can be argued, for instance that war is grotesque. But in truth war is also beauty.” The contradictions held in war are obvious to O`Brien and he tries to get his reader to understand that war is a series of contradictions that tell of how war is more complex than just painting it with a good or bad. In the story of the water buffalo we see Rat Kiley enjoying himself with his friend Curt Lemon one second and then a second later crying over his dead friend Curt Lemon, the contradiction of being alive and joyous and then dead and depressed. Another time a contradiction is shown is when Rat caters to the water Buffalo by trying to feed it one second and then fires at the water buffalo to make it suffer the next. It mirrors that of war itself, you’re happy at the beginning as your honorably fighting for your country and then wishing to go home when on the battlefield. Contradictions can also be found when looking from perspective when compared to another. Rat Kiley to the reader probably seemed destructive and aggressive towards the buffalo who found that the animal did nothing wrong but to the other characters; seen through their perspective, Rat Kiley was just hurt and trying his best to cope with his friend’s death. The truth of a “true war story” being contradictory is in that of a war story being complex and very volatile while also being based on the perspective, but the fiction is either way looking at a war there is nothing but
loss. “To generalize about war is like generalizing about peace. Almost everything is true. Almost nothing is true.” When O`Brien speaks of War as not being able to generalize it is to give war the distinction of being an experience like no other and has the effect on a person of making them feel alive because they are about to die, they have to feel the rush when in the battle and of course during the battle you can die at any moment. Although in Rat Kiley`s experience where his friend dies, it is barely shown where as friends Rat and Curt were having the time of their life as they were enjoying their freedom they completely forgot about the war and then it hit Rat and he realized both the most beautiful and ugliest part of the war. Generalizing about war is impossible because as O`Brien says himself “In war you lose your sense of the definite, hence your sense of truth itself, and therefore it’s safe to say in a true war story nothing is absolutely truth. “You can tell a true war story by the way it never seems to end.” O`Brien is capable of saying this and is almost any war veteran as with war comes loss and a “true war story” exemplifies that loss as when a war story is told your mind never really forgets the event that happened in that war story. For example Rat Kiley`s loss of his friend Curt Lemon will never be forgotten by Rat and is understood by only those who knew the true version of that “true war story.” Overall the story of the baby water buffalo contributes to O`Brien`s explanation on how to tell a true war story by proving to be an example of a “true war story” following the criteria of turning ones stomach, not being able to be generalized, have hidden meanings behind hidden meanings, being never ending and having a contradictory meaning of war. The differentiation between the truth and the fiction lie in the difference between “true war stories” being told the best they can be by a soldier but cannot be completely true because during war a soldier is too alive to notice what is actually fact and what is a lie. The story is being told but to the best of O’Brien’s ability as it was probably to hard to remember the exact details but still has the same effect of making the reader understand what a “true war story” is.
‘The Things They Carried’ by Tim O’Brien provides a insider’s view of war and its distractions, both externally in dealing with combat and internally dealing with the reality of war and its effect on each solder. The story, while set in Vietnam, is as relevant today with the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan as it was in the 1960’s and 1970’s in Southeast Asia. With over one million soldiers having completed anywhere from one to three tours in combat in the last 10 years, the real conflict might just be inside the soldier. O’Brien reflects this in his writing technique, using a blend of fiction and autobiographical facts to present a series of short narratives about a small unit of soldiers. While a war story, it is also an unrequited love story too, opening with Jimmy Cross holding letters from a girl he hoped would fall in love with him. (O’Brien 1990).
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.
In his short story, O’Brien unravels step by step the irony in the double meaning of truth, implied in this first statement, “This is true”, to the reader which is then woven through the entire story. By trying to characterize what constitutes a true war story, but never really achieving this goal, the true irony of his short story is revealed. Even though in some instances giving away his opinion explicitly, the sheer contradiction of honesty and reality becomes even more visible in an implicit way by following O’Brien’s explanations throughout the story while he deconstructs his first statement. The incongruity between his first statement and what is actually shown in his examples does not need any explicit statements to drive home his message.
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
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.
Some authors choose to write stories and novels specifically to evoke certain emotions from their readers as opposed to writing it for just a visual presentation. In order to do this, they occasionally stretch the truth and “distort” the event that actually occurred. The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien, is a compilation of short stories about the Vietnam War with distortion being a key element in each of them.
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.
Through The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien moves beyond the horror of fighting in the Vietnam War to examine with sensitivity and insight the nature of courage and fear. Included, is a collection of interrelated stories. A few of the stories are brutal, while others are flawed, blurring the distinction between fact and fiction. All the stories, however, deal with one platoon. Some are about the wartime experiences of soldiers, and others are about a 43-year-old writer reminiscing about his platoon’s experiences. In the beginning chapter, O’Brien rambles about the items the soldiers carry into battle, ranging from can openers, pocketknives, and mosquito repellent o 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).
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.
Vietnam War a war that took many lives. A war that change the people,the nation and our views. In “The Things They Carried” by Tim O'Brien, symbolism is the key into getting the reader understand life behind the line. Tim O'Brien writing give the readers the vivid image through the fact the war has a deeper meaning than one can believe. In this story we see how everyday life through symbols are used in literature writing.
Symbolism in stories is dependent on how the author writes, the title, and the characters. Titles in literature are very important to the symbolism of a story an example of this is Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried”. As the story goes on it shows not only the literal meaning of what they carried but also symbolically the burdens that they had mentally.
Tim O’Brien’s novel The Things They Carried challenges the reader to question what they are reading. In the chapter “How to Tell a True War Story”, O’Brien claims that the story is true, and then continues to tell the story of Curt’s death and Rat Kiley’s struggle to cope with the loss of his best friend. As O’Brien is telling the story, he breaks up the story and adds in fragments about how the reader should challenge the validity of every war story. For example, O’Brien writes “you can tell a true war story by its absolute and uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil” (69), “in many cases a true war story cannot be believed” (71), “almost everything is true. Almost nothing is true” (81), and “a thing may happen and be a total lie; another thing may not happen and be truer than the truth (83). All of those examples are ways in which O’Brien hinted that his novel is a work of fiction, and even though the events never actually happened – their effects are much more meaningful. When O’Brien says that true war stories are never about war, he means that true war stories are about all the factors that contribute to the life of the soldiers like “love and memory” (85) rather than the actual war. Happening truth is the current time in which the story was being told, when O’Brien’s daughter asked him if he ever killed anyone, he answered no in happening truth because it has been 22 years since he was in war and he is a different person when his daughter asked him. Story truth
In The “Things They Carried” by Tim O’brien the change in the point of view from the chapter "The Things They Carried" to the following chapters "Love, Spin, On the Rainy River," affects the tone by helping show the change in his attitude towards these stories.
In The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien distinguishes between two kinds of truth-happening truth and story truth. Happening truth is the events that actually took place and are true, the unbiased skeleton. However, story truth is adding fictional substance to the bones of the truth, by adding more details that are not necessarily false but not exactly true and show the perspective of the soldiers. Story truth is a more effective way than historical truth to tell about the Vietnam War because it shows how the war was actually viewed by some of the soldiers. Historical truth is only pure facts and sometimes in order to really comprehend what actually took place a little exaggeration is needed.
This allows the reader to see what takes place rather than what is perceived. O’Brien’s main objective is to expose the subjectivity that lies within truth. To point out a specific contradiction within truth, he uses war to highlight this difference. He writes, “The truths are contradictory. It can be argued, for instance, that war is grotesque. But in truth war is also beauty” (77). The truth has two different meanings and it all depends on who is interpreting it. One person may think one truth and another person can see the complete opposite. To go along with this ambiguity within truth he states, “Almost everything is true. Almost nothing is true” (77). He once again shows that truth is up for interpretation. There is not a single, universal truth, however, there are many variations of it. As previously mentioned, O’Brien claims that he honestly admit that he has both never killed a man and has in fact killed somebody. Here he is stating that there can be completely different answers that all seem to be the truthful. Whether or not O’Brien killed someone, he felt like he did, but could answer that he didn’t. It is this discrepancy that proves that it is all relative. When it comes to telling the story it becomes “difficult difficult to separate what happened from what seemed to happen,” (67). This is what causes the subjectivity, the unknowingness of the situation. Since