The Things They Carried Passage Analysis

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 first chapter "The Things They Carried" is told in third person to tell us common things carried, and odd things to better understand the characters. It helped the reader know some of the normal experiences in a war “They carried Sterno, safety pins, trip flares, signal flares, spools of wire,.” Then in the next chapter “Love” it is told in first person, and is told after the war. When he switches to first person you can sense the straightforward and curiosity in his conversation

but the curiosity about Cross’s past love Martha “ I'm not sure how I phrased it—just a general question—but Jimmy Cross looked up in surprise.” After that in chapter 3 “Spin” is told first person but in a different way than “Love.” He tells his memories from the war, but explaining that they're not all bad. While reading you can tell the peacefulness in his voice, “I remember Norman Bowker and Henry Dobbins playing checkers every evening before dark.” With this in mind the reader can then see in chapter 4 “On a Rainy River” he is very self conscious we he talks about this experience in the war. He just didn’t tell anyone about one of his experiences not even the ones closest to him,“this is one story I've never told before. Not to anyone.” Tone is an important part of a story and can change the reader’s interpretation. The way Tim O’brien wrote this story was at times confusing, but made it unique by being able to seeing the experiences in different ways.