Tim O'Brien in "The Things They Carried" tells stories of memories and fictional stories of soldiers lives during the Vietnam War, and beyond. Most importantly O'Brien focuses in on his own life, and people impacted on his life. The book begins explaining what a soldier carries, not only are they just carrying their own bodies and physical belongings, but also a whole life full memories behind him. These soldiers are carrying memories with them throughout a different world of Vietnam that no one could imagine at home. O'Brien shows how story telling is a way to cope through the devastating war, that is beyond reality for others to grasp.
Even though the stories O'Brien shares seem real throughout the book, they are all still fiction. For example when O'Brien describes what a war story is he states, "You can't even tell a true war story, sometimes it is just beyond telling" (68). Therefore showing what the soldiers experience in the Vietnam War was too devastating to put into words to truly illustrate to others what it was like. If O'Brien wrote about true stories it would create no emotion to the reader because it is impossible to feel the true devastation.
The point then of creating fictional war stories is to use it as a coping mechanism to help put the pieces together of ones experiences in Vietnam. For example when O'Brien states, What stories can do, I guess, is make things present" (172). In doing so he can evaluate what he has seen years ago in Vietnam in order to try to search for reasoning.
"The Things They Carried" Is a tremendous piece of work, that incorporates multiple thoughts into one main central idea of the effects on war on people even though the war has been over for years. Except the Vietnam will never be truly over because story telling will bring all the details of war and the souls who lost their lives back to the present.
Tim O'Brien in "The Things They Carried" tells stories of memories and fictional stories of soldiers lives during the Vietnam War, and beyond. Most importantly O'Brien focuses in on his own character, and people impacted on his life. The book begins explaining what a soldier carries, not only are they just carrying their own bodies and physical belongings, but also a whole life full memories behind him. These soldiers are carrying memories with them throughout a different world of Vietnam that no one could imagine at home. O'Brien shows how story telling is a way to cope through the devastating war, that is beyond reality for others to grasp.
ReplyDeleteEven though the stories O'Brien shares seem real throughout the book, they are all made up war stories. For example when O'Brien describes what a war story is he states, "You can't even tell a true war story, sometimes it is just beyond telling" (68). Therefore, showing what the soldiers experience in the Vietnam War was too devastating to put into words to truly illustrate to others what it was like. If O'Brien wrote about true stories it would create no emotion to the reader because they would be unable to feel the devastation.
The point then of creating fictional war stories is to use it as a coping mechanism to help put the pieces together of ones experiences in Vietnam. For example when O'Brien states, What stories can do, I guess, is make things present" (172). In doing so, he can evaluate what he has seen years ago in Vietnam in order to try to search for reasoning.
"The Things They Carried" Is a tremendous piece of work, that incorporates multiple thoughts into one main central idea of the effects on war on people even though the war has been over for years. Except the Vietnam will never be truly over because story telling will bring all the details of war and the souls who lost their lives back to the present.