Relationships In The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

The friendships created at war give soldiers hope. When Lemon died, Rat was a wreck. “The whole platoon stood there watching, feeling all kinds of things, but there wasn’t a great deal of pity for the baby water buffalo. Curt Lemon was dead. Rat Kiley had lost his best friend in the world” (O’Brien 79).

Hunter Berman Ms.Silver AP English P-4 6/7/2018 The things They Carried Historical Report The Things They Carried is a novel written by Tim O'Brien about U.S. soldiers stationed in Vietnam and their personal stories of what they literally and emotionally carry. He focus on what the soldiers have on their person and how each of those items have an effect on them for reason specific to them.

Throughout O’ Brien’s story, his gives the audience a way to relate to the soldiers

Although Andy Wiest's Boys of '67 and Stephen Ambrose's Band of Brothers are set in different historical periods, with the former taking place during the Vietnam War and the latter in World War II, both stories reveal similarities in the soldiers' experiences on the battlefield. These shared elements center around camaraderie, and the collective experience of trauma. However, notable differences also existed, such as the objectives of each war, the character of the conflicts, and the public perceptions surrounding them. Despite the transformative shift in warfare from World War II to the Vietnam War, a consistent theme emerges in the narratives of Wiest and Ambrose- death and dealing with trauma.

The physical damage and emotional depreciation that the characters go through in the book, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, support the themes of the story by showing the traumatic effects the soldiers endure as a result of the war. December 1, 1969, changed lives of many people because it was the date that renewed mandatory service. The US draft for Vietnam brought many young boys into new surroundings and sent them crawling with an invisible enemy. Their normal lives were forever changed. No longer surrounded by familiar faces, their new homes were now foxholes, forcing them to stay alert at all times.

Readers, especially those reading historical fiction, always crave to find believable stories and realistic characters. Tim O’Brien gives them this in “The Things They Carried.” Like war, people and their stories are often complex. This novel is a collection stories that include these complex characters and their in depth stories, both of which are essential when telling stories of the Vietnam War. Using techniques common to postmodern writers, literary techniques, and a collection of emotional truths, O’Brien helps readers understand a wide perspective from the war, which ultimately makes the fictional stories he tells more believable.

Some of the conflicts O'Brien's platoon had to face was the weather and trying to survive Vietnam. O’Brien’s intended audience is everyone who did not experience the Vietnam War. Two of the major themes of his book were morality and mortality and death. In the chapter ‘‘In the Field’’ O’Brien uses the theme morality.

This chapter “The Ghost Soldiers”, showed us how Tim O’Brien and the other soldiers were dealing with the war both physically and psychologically. It also shows us how the Tim O'Brien behaved and felt when he was shot, wounded and had a bacteria infection on his butt and how the war changed the way he thought, and viewed the other soldiers around him. This chapter also contain a lot of psychological lens. From the way Tim O’Brien felt when he was shot and separated from his unit to a new unit to when he wanted revenge on Bobby Jorgenson for almost “killing” him.

Throughout the entire story, the narrator explains how close the men become to each other. You become brothers and you trust each other with your lives. In the chapter, The Ghost Soldiers, Tim O’Brien sees the men he was on the platoon with and is

He fought a war in Vietnam that he knew nothing about, all he knew was that, “Certain blood was being shed for uncertain reasons” (38). He realized that he put his life on the line for a war that is surrounded in controversy and questions. Through reading The Things They Carried, it was easy to feel connected to the characters; to feel their sorrow, confusion, and pain. O’Briens ability to make his readers feel as though they are actually there in the war zones with him is a unique ability that not every author possess.

War: The Idea of Friendship In the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, the stories are mainly focused on the Vietnamese War and it’s effects on the soldiers. The two stories, Friends and Enemies clearly portray the personal problems faced by the soldiers during the war instead of problems in the actual war that the soldiers are fighting. In Enemies, Dave Jensen breaks Lee Strunk's nose over a stolen jackknife and is later found contemplating whether or not Strunk will get his revenge on him, causing him to become delusional. In Friends, however, both Strunk and Jensen agree to sign a pact that says if anyone of them gets hurt badly, the other will kill them.

They became very good friends through hardships. Their friendship lasted through the war and many years after. They weren 't friends, they were brothers.

Although the soldier he killed was an enemy soldier, instead of vilifying him he was able to humanize the man. O’Brien was able to describe the physical appearance of the soldier and imagine her life before war. The author was able to portray an emotional connection and made the line between friend and enemy almost vanish. This was able to reveal the natural beauty of shared humanity even in the context of war’s horror. O’Brien is able to find the beauty in the midst of this tragic and horrible event.

The Things They Carried “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien is a short story set during the Vietnam War. In the story, O’Brien lists many different items soldiers in the Alpha Company carried with them as they humped across the rugged terrain. Many carried necessities such as rations, matches, ammunition and things of that nature; however, many soldiers also carried quite peculiar objects such as condoms, pantyhose, and M&Ms. Readers can grasp a closer insight of the characters’ lives after further examination of the symbolism and meaning of the things they carried.

Tim O'Brien's short story, "The Things They Carried", is a personal narrative of the time he served in the military during the Vietnam War. His experience in the war along with his platoon shows how soldiers have to conform to the specific image of a tough, brave, and emotionless warrior courageously fighting in the heat of battle. However, the story shows young soldiers who try to follow this image, but end up showing individuality by being their true selves. In the nature of war, most soldiers will try to conform to this image, however showing individuality isn't always a negative thing. At first, the group of very young soldiers who have just been drafted try to show their masculinity by hiding their true emotions such as fear.