The Narrator In The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

The story is a first-person story that is narrated by Sonny ‘s brother who provides not only insight into their lives, but also the environment they lived in. The narrator addresses their storyline including the dark sides of his community although he does so with a lot of cautious. With the manner in which the narrator is narrating the story, it is clear that he has got some difficult time when he is expressing his ideas and emotions. The narrator writes after the death of her daughter where he is writing back to his brother.

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.

Sonny’s letter written to the narrator in response to the news of the narrator’s daughter dying serves an important role in the story by reestablishing the relationship between the brothers and giving the reader insight into the misery that Sonny felt as a result of his actions. It is revealed to the reader that before the narrator had written his letter to Sonny, that the two had not been on speaking terms for a long time. After hearing of the news, Sonny wrote the letter back to the narrator which formally began their newfound connection to each other. It is revealed within the letter Sonny’s reasoning’s behind his imprisonment as well as the sadness he felt within. Sonny describes himself as “trying to climb up out of some deep, real deep

Author Steven Kaplan interpretation went as followed. “In his most recent work of fiction, The Things They Carried, Tim O'Brien takes the act of trying to reveal and understand the uncertainties about the war one step further, by looking at it through the imagination.” (Kaplan, Steven) Although Tim O’Brien actively served his country by fighting in Vietnam, his character Lt. Cross was a representation of O’Brien in this story. O’Brien gives his readers a combination of Uncertainty mixed with imagination, this enabled the story to have a complex variety of issues to keep his readers engaged in the story.

In the story the narrator is an algebra schoolteacher, and older brother to Sonny. He wants to escape Harlem but is unable to. the narrator constantly struggles with a combination of guilt and anger when his brother, Sonny, is arrested for possession of heroin. You can see when the narrator says he felt “like a bastard” for not writing to him sooner (47-49) The narrator was so frightened and guilty of what Sonny has become he was never prepared to face him because the narrator feels he failed his obligation as brother it only takes him losing his daughter to contact Sonny.

He describes the childhood friend of Sonny as being “high and raggy” and smelling “funky,” and later a woman as having a “battered face” and being a “semi-whore” (68-69). These vivid character descriptions sharply contrast the strong lack of environmental descriptions found at the beginning of the story. These environmental descriptions are not yet found because Sonny has not yet come back to the city. Since the environment is used as a tool for describing the relationship between the brothers, it can not be described fully until the relationship is at play. As soon as the narrator is reunited with Sonny, he begins to fully describe his surroundings.

In The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, the truth is distorted. O’Brien’s writing style cause the readers to question whether the novel is based on the truth or not. The author distorts the point of view, voice, and time for the readers to discerns the truth. Tim O’Brien uses both first and third-person narrative in the novel. Throughout the novel, O’Brien’s perspective is not constant and shifts between first and third-person.

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.

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.

In contrast, the narrator internalizes his feelings by repressing them as his father did after his brother passed away. As it was the relationship of their father and uncle, Sonny and his brother grew up in Harlem, a district replete with hopelessness and poverty. Yet each individual reacts to his environment in unusual ways. On the one hand, the narrator distances himself from his community in Harlem, including his brother Sonny. The narrator may love his brother but is in general judgmental of the direction of Sonny's life struggles and decisions.

They both went through the same childhood, but handled it differently. The narrator was more mature and had set goals. While Sonny, fell into the depth of his feeling and influences. The narrator cares for his brother and feels as if he has failed him. While his brother feels like he could never truly explain anything to the narrator.

Tim O’Brien uses storytelling and memories to bring characters and events back to life in order to tell their story. O’Brien wants the readers to understand that even though people die and an event is no longer occurring, the event or person is not gone entirely. The Things They Carried is a book written by a man named Tim O’Brien. He is considered, “The best American writer of his generation,” by the San Fransisco Examiner.

Before the narrator gets married his mother asks him to help Sonny “and don’t let him fall, no matter what it looks like is happening to him and no matter how evil you gets with him” (Baldwin, 165). Yet time brings memories to a close and the narrator soon forgets his promise. On the subway he reads the paper to discover that Sonny was in jail but doesn’t immediately write him a letter. After the narrator’s daughter, Gracie, dies he writes a letter to Sonny. Sonny writes back and they continue to exchange letters until Sonny comes back to New York.

The third person single vision point of view of a tough sniper fighting a civil war enemy, in Liam O’Flaherty’s “The Sniper,” plays with the reader’s emotions throughout the story. He employs third person single vision point of view to tell the sniper’s intense adventure from an outside narrator who has access to the mind of the protagonist. O’Flaherty chose third person single vision POV because distancing the reader is the only way to develop a tough protagonist that the reader can be intimate with, taking into account his limited intellectual skills. Having sensory details about the sniper from the single vision third person POV narrator in addition to knowing the protagonist 's thoughts while combating an enemy, allows O’Flaherty to characterize “The Sniper” into a hefty person. Some may argue, writing in first person point of view would have created a tough protagonist because they would see it through the eyes of the sniper who they automatically assume is resilient.

In fiction, the narrator controls how the audience connects to and perceives the various characters in a story. A good author can manipulate the narration to connect the audience to certain characters and deepen the reader’s understanding of their conflicts. In “Previous Condition” and “Sonny’s Blues,” James Baldwin illustrates themes of loneliness and isolation in the pursuit of finding a space that feels like home. Although this theme is clear in both stories, Baldwin is able to portray it very differently in each story through the relationship he allows the reader to the characters struggling with these feelings. While “Previous Condition” provides a more intimate relationship to the narrator, “Sonny’s Blues” is able to deliver an additional level of understanding by telling the story through Sonny’s brother, therefore disconnecting the reader in a way that forces him or her to share the characters’ feelings of isolation and confusion.