“War becomes a part of you”? It is a feeling just as much as an experience” -Clint Van Winkle. In Fallen Angels, the readers get to experience this first hand as they follow Ritch Perry, a soldier in the Vietnam War, through the emotional roller coaster of new friendships, death, and the trauma. Walter Dean Myers in his novel Fallen Angels uses the experiences of the soldiers to teach readers that some trauma cannot be forgotten. Most of the soldiers had little to no experience fighting in the army. “I finished high school, but I hadn't gone to the graduation exercise” (Myers 13). Many of these soldiers were teenagers who just got out of school. “I was scared of him. My mouth was going dry, and I could see Peewee was scared, too.” (Myers 24). …show more content…
They stood around waiting for orders, scared of what was going to happen. “I had forgotten to load the damn thing” (Myers 80). Being young and inexperienced, it's easy to forget little things, but in war those little things could cost someone their life. With all the fighting, they had to find ways to cope. The “Prayer” can be very comforting. I wonder if any of you men would like to pray with me?” (Myers 223). The soldiers often turned to God when faced with hardships. “Then he asked me for a cigarette, and we were sitting there smoking when the captain came in”(Myers47). They used cigarettes as a distraction from the war and loss. “When I got to the back of the truck, Peewee was cracking up. I laughed with him. Jenkins started imitating the sergeant, and had his voice down perfectly” (Myers 26). Lighting the mood with some jokes and a little fooling around was helpful during the war. Death was a very big part of the war. They lost friends they had made and also feared death themselves. They were young and not ready to die. The “Shock” is a slam. Pain. I am a snob. Nobody wanted to look at anybody
“Fallen Angels”, written by Walter Dean Myers, is a novel that tells about the story of young boys going into battle during the Vietnam War. There are many themes in “Fallen Angels” but the main theme is the loss of innocence. The title makes reference to these themes. And the boys in the book have dreams of losing their virginity and drinking alcohol for the first time. They are thrown into a harsh reality when they are shown the trials of war. In the end, they understand that the movies that depict heroicness and honor are just images of a false idea; that war is full of chaos and horror.
"War is always, in all ways, appalling." This is how author Gary Paulsen describes war in his novel Soldier's Heart. Soldier's Heart is what we now know as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Paulsen displayed many examples of appalling events in Soldier's Heart. Some events were from deaths of fellow men, or traumatic experiences. Many of these events have scarred many soldiers around the world. Here are a few examples of scarring, appalling events included in Gary Paulsen's novel, Soldier's Heart.
“We did not break down, but adapted ourselves” These soldiers know that modern warfare is extremely complicated and demands knowledge and experience. They learn how the differentiate shell sounds, when to take cover, when it’s safe to take off your gas mask, how to tell shrapnel from high explosives. It is shown through the naive and inexperienced recruits that not knowing and applying this knowledge is fatal. Some soldiers call on their innermost animal instincts to allow them to kill mercilessly on the field, using the assistance of a metaphor Remarque writes “We are dead men with no feelings, who are able by some trick to keep on running and keep on killing.” Granted war is a barbaric affair, ironically sometimes the worst of conditions can bring out the best in people. This is through the form of comrade and mate ship. On the field fellow soldiers would provide mutual support for each other and create extremely tight bonds. This is shown in All Quiet on the Western Front through Paul and his tight nit platoon. Paul’s unique experience with mate ship is how especially close he is with his friend Kat. This is expressed in the recounting of when they stole and cooked a goose together. Remarque writes “We don't talk much, but I believe we have a more complete communion with one another than even lovers have.” This shows how mate ship was
When Paul was in the war he and his Friend Kat ran into a recruit that had been shot and they were debating whether or not to put him out of his misery. "We'll be back again soon," says Kat, "We are only going to get a stretcher for you."We don't know if he understands. He whimpers like a child and plucks at us: "Don't go away--” Kat looks around and whispers: "Shouldn't we just take a revolver and put an end to it?" (Page 34). In the movie Gallipoli, the main character Archy was a runner and he had no idea what he had gotten himself into. But when it was his time to cross the front line he had hesitation and did what he had signed up for. In the poem In Flanders Field it makes you feel sad for all the lives that had been lost. “Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields.” this gives you a feeling of sadness for all the people who died and their families that they will never see
Imagine being in an ongoing battle where friends and others are dying. All that is heard are bullets being shot, it smells like gas is near, and hearts race as the times goes by. This is similar to what war is like. In the novel All Quiet on the Western Front, the narrator, Paul Baumer, and his friends encounter the ideals of suffering, death, pain, and despair. There is a huge change in these men; at the beginning of the novel they are enthusiastic about going into the war. After they see what war is really like, they do not feel the same way about it. During the war the men experience many feelings especially the loss of loved ones. These feelings are shown through their first experience at training camp, during the actual battles, and in the hospital.
Henry Fosdick once said, “The tragedy of war is that it uses man’s best to do man’s worst.” In “The Red Convertible” by Louis Erdrich, there is a conflict amongst two brothers, Henry and Lyman as ones awareness towards reality is shifted upon the return of the Vietnam War. Henry’s experience fighting in the Vietnam War is the responsibility for the unexpected aftermath that affects their brotherhood. The event of Henry fighting in the war through fears, emotions and horrors that he encounters is the source of his “Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome [PTSD].” It has shaped his own perception of reality and his relationship with his brother Lyman and the strong bond that they had shared.
The Things They Carried describes real objects American soldiers carried during the war. They carried an M-60, a .45-caliber pistol, an assault rifle, ammunition, compass, maps, code books, the PRC-25 radio, sandbags, tanning lotion, toilet paper, tranquilizers, rabbit’s foot, Purple Hearts, diseases, the wounded, the weak, and the land itself. Many soldiers experienced horrific events in Vietnam. War affects the mind. O’Brien said, “We all got problems.” (O’Brien 18). O’Brien relates one example of the war’s negative effect when a soldier shoots a baby water buffalo. He not only wants to kill the animal, but to make it suffer. Silence disturbs soldiers. Many times soldiers think they hear something which results in a bad decision. O’Brien describes a group on night watch who hear noises, go crazy...
"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.
Both, he and Sonny go off to war to escape poverty. “Fallen Angels” is written by Walter Dean Myers, a famous African American writer. Born and raised in the projects of Harlem, New York, Perry joined the army as an escape out of Harlem: "My plans, maybe just my dreams really, had been to go to college, and to write like James Baldwin. All the other guys in the neighborhood thought I was going to college. I wasn’t, and the army was the place I was going to get away from all the questions"(15). The main reason he decides to go off to war is because he could not afford college, and Perry thought the best escape would be joining the army. Although racial equality within the army and the nation was already established before the Vietnam War, racial tension still caused Perry to join the
The war scarred the soldiers permanently, if not physically then mentally. After the war the soldiers usually never recovered from the war. Two of the most common side affects of the war were shell shock and stir crazy. When suffering from shell shock a soldier’s brain doesn’t function properly and the man is a “vegetable”. This means the man is alive but he can’t do anything because he is in a state of shock because of the war. Stir crazy is a mental illness caused by the firing of so many bullets that when no bullets are heard by the victim he goes insane. Everyone was scared to go to war when it started. Young recruits were first sent because the veterans knew they were going to come back dead. "When we run out again, although I am very excited, I suddenly think: “where’s Himmelstoss?” Quickly I jump back into the dug-out and find him with a small scratch lying in a corner pretending to be wounded.” (P 131) Even the big men like Himmelstoss are scared to go fight. They too go through the mental illnesses like stir crazy and shell shock. “He is in a panic; he is new to it too.
...ust deal with similar pains. Through the authors of these stories, we gain a better sense of what soldiers go through and the connection war has on the psyche of these men. While it is true, and known, that the Vietnam War was bloody and many soldiers died in vain, it is often forgotten what occurred to those who returned home. We overlook what became of those men and of the pain they, and their families, were left coping with. Some were left with physical scars, a constant reminder of a horrible time in their lives, while some were left with emotional, and mental, scarring. The universal fact found in all soldiers is the dramatic transformation they all undergo. No longer do any of these men have a chance to create their own identity, or continue with the aspirations they once held as young men. They become, and will forever be, soldiers of the Vietnam War.
One of the hardest events that a soldier had to go through during the war was when one of their friends was killed. Despite their heartbreak they could not openly display their emotions. They could not cry because soldiers do not cry. Such an emotional display like crying would be sign of weakness and they didn’t want to be weak, so they created an outlet. “They were actors. When someone died, it wasn’t quite dying because in a curious way it seemed scripted”(19). Of course things were scripted especially when Ted Lavender died. It had happened unexpectedly and if they didn’t have something planned to do while they were coping they would all have broken down especially Lieutenant Cross. Cross...
They need to know how to escape the shells, as well as the emotional and psychological torment of the war. The war takes a heavy toll on the soldiers who fight in it. The terror of death will infest the minds of soldiers and bring about horrible images of death and destruction until they break down and go to pieces.... ... middle of paper ...
... could not help themselves, they were not going to be helped. If struggle were encountered, men had personalized ways to reconnect with the real world, and if a tragedy were encountered which affected the entire company, they also found a combined way to cope with this pressure. The priorities of men during the war shifted greatly toward emotional connections to people and events other than the war, and it was these connections that helped them survive and return home. Coping with the stress and burden of war is not an easy task for anyone, yet in The Things they Carried, O'Brien depicts men dealing and coping as much as they can, using only their primeval resources. They learn how to cope with the barest necessities in life, and they learn how to make use of the smallest opportunities to obtain the most relief and joy from every moment in life.
Many individuals look at soldiers for hope and therefore, add load to them. Those that cannot rationally overcome these difficulties may create Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Tragically, some resort to suicide to get away from their insecurities. Troops, notwithstanding, are not by any means the only ones influenced by wars; relatives likewise encounter mental hardships when their friends and family are sent to war. Timothy Findley precisely depicts the critical impact wars have on people in his novel by showing how after-war characters are not what they were at the beginning.