Tim O Brien Figurative Language Analysis

In the novel, “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien, he describes parts of his war experiences through the stories told throughout the book. O’Brien discusses the gory detailed chaos of the Vietnam war and his fellow “soldiers.” As O’Brien gives detail of the his “fictional” experiences, he explains why he joined the war. He also describes a time where his “character” wanted to escape a draft to Canada.
In the chapter titled, “On the Rainy River,” O’Brien demonstrates his “experience” of going into the war, and being drafted to Canada. O’Brien adds immense amount of detail to express the things motivating him from wanting to escape the draft. “I’d slipped out of my own skin hovering a few feet away while some poor yo-yo with my name and

face tried to make his way toward a future he didn’t understand and didn’t want.” (O’Brien 52) O’Brien illustrates a figurative feeling to how he felt going to Canada, where he’d later go to Vietnam for war.

The figurative language of O’Brien “slipping out of his skin” emphasizes O’Brien’s narrow-minded picture of being drafted and going into war. The feeling of not knowing motivated O’Brien to want to escape the draft. O’Brien illustrates Canada in great detail so the reader may understand the scenery, which was a motivation for O’Brien wanting to escape war. “All around us, there was a vastness to the world, an unpeopled rawness, just the trees and the sky and the water reaching out toward nowhere.” (O’Brien 53) The words, “unpeopled rawness” projects the detail that the emptiness of the scenery-no people just nature-made O’Brien want to escape the draft, because he was not ready to face that type of reality, which would see unfamiliar faces. The river represents another motivation for O’Brien wanting to escape the draft. “I could’ve done it. I

could’ve jumped and started swimming for my life...I felt a terrible squeezing pressure. Even now, as I write this, I can still feel that tightness.” (O’Brien 54) The river became a motive of how O’Brien could have escaped the draft. The pressure it gave O’Brien made him have an emotional breakdown. He also directly talks to the reader to put themselves in his shoes. “Would you jump?...Would it feel like dying? Would you cry, as I did?...I tried to smile, except I was crying.” (O’Brien 54) As O’Brien impels the reader to imagine themselves in his shoes, O’Brien directly describes his emotion feeling in that moment. His feelings and thoughts created another motivation for escaping the draft, especially the emotion of “not knowing.” As O’Brien describes his emotional breakdown and thought process in that moment, he also brings the reader into his psychotic breakdown and stressed feeling, which builds to why he “ultimately joins the war.”
As O’Brien details the important points to why he joined the war, he describes how the emotions lead to a flash of the past.

“Chunks of my own history flashed by.”(O’Brien 55) Instead of actually sinking into the river, he figuratively sinks into a “wave” of his past, which describes many people in his life. “ I saw a seven-year-old boy in a white cowboy hat and a Lone Ranger mask… I saw a sixteen-year-old kid decked out for his first prom, looking spiffy in a white tux and a black bow tie, his hair cut short and flat, his shoes freshly polished.” (O’Brien 55) O’Brien begins to see himself through memorable moments in his life. A moment after he begins to enter into a giant hallucination, “I saw my parents...my brother and sister, all the townsfolk, the mayor and the entire Chamber of Commerce and all my old buddies. Like some outlandish sporting event:... A squad of cheerleaders did cartwheels along the banks of the Rainy River....A marching band played fight songs. All my aunts and uncles...a nine-year-old girl named Linda…little kids without arms or legs...they were all whooping and chanting and urging me toward one shore or the other.”(O’Brien 55-56) O’Brien sees these people, and gives him more pressure to whether or not he should join the war or escape the draft. The intense hallucination, which even made him see children without limbs, placed a huge weight on his decision. The feeling of shame projected from these people pressured O’Brien to join the war. “All those

eyes on me-the town, the whole universe-and I couldn’t risk the embarrassment. It was if there were an audience to my life,...in my head I could hear people screaming at me. Traitor! they yelled. Turncoat! Pussy! I felt myself blush. I couldn’t tolerate it. I couldn’t endure the mockery, or the disgrace, or the patriotic ridicule... I couldn’t make myself be brave. It had nothing to do with morality. Embarrassment, that’s all it was.” The shaming in his mind turned into a real thing, so it made O’Brien actually feel as if these people were watching him and it made him feel embarrassment. The embarrassment he wanted to escape from the draft because of this O’Brien decided he would go to war. Another motivation for O’Brien going into war is so he could prove his parents he can be independent and is mature. “I don’t smoke or drink…I’m finishing up a letter to my parents that tells what I’m about to do and why I’m doing it and how I am sorry that I’d never found the courage to talk to them about it…I just say that it’s a thing that has to be done...as I chose a life for myself.”(O’Brien 52-53) The quote states lots of information a reader can guess about O’Brien. O’Brien is a good kid, who never really said much to his family. He couldn’t really explain to his parents why he wanted to go to war, all he knew is he had to do it. The words “I chose a life for myself,” expresses his adulthood, that he could now make decisions for himself; this also conveys a reason for O’Brien joining war.
O’ Brien represents lots of detail and figurative language in order to illustrate his motivations for why he wanted to escape the war, and his ultimate reason for joining the war. O’Brien goes through a psychotic emotional breakdown as he at the merge of going to Vietnam. His surroundings create the motivation for wanting to escape the war. O’Brien’s emotional hallucination enhances the motivation towards his general reason for joining the war.