Tim O Brien Heroes Analysis

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Tim O’Brien’s speech “Heroes” is a tribute to a distant friend that O’Brien perceives as his hero. The face of a hero is thought to be a strong, perhaps athletic, perhaps Almighty image in the public, yet O’Brien believes otherwise. He is not only praising and thanking Elroy Birdall, O’Brien is redefining the meaning of the word “hero” with the help of analogy, characterization, as well as imagery and juxtaposition.

To paraphrase, O’Brien means to define heroism as the courage to go against the waves of society and its perception of right and wrong. As quoted from Elroy “‘There should be a law…if you vote for the war…you have to go fight in it in the front lines, or else you have to send you mother’” (O’Brien 278), Elroy sees the pain and terror that O’Brien faced for either option; however, Elroy never sends O’Brien back down to Michigan as any other law abiding citizen would have done. He understands that O’Brien is young and terrified and doing his best to escape a war (278), the legality of the matter is never discussed, in fact, nothing is discussed. Elroy gives him protection and safety from the world as if there could be no potential consequences for himself. …show more content…

Elroy is characterized as “tiny shrunken, bald old man”, yet this is juxtaposed with “[he was] like God.” These two images are not linked; God would never be described as a “shrunken” man. O’Brien draws this analogy: Elroy was to O’Brien as God is to the faithful. The old caretaker is a theophany, or a human incarnation of God, which was meant to create a passive figure to calm external conditions to allow for the internal conflict to be

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