The Things They Carried Essay Things They Carried: Summary The Things They Carried Essay example Essay on The Things They Carried

1. The Things They Carried Essay
The Things They Carried
Tim O'Brien was an infantryman in during Vietnam War. He used those experiences to write many
short stories including The Things They Carried. The story portrays how, "the things they carried"
were weightless in comparison to their feelings of love and loss, fear and shame, and the torturous
memories of death. "They all carried emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love,
longing– these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity, they
had tangible weight."
The things they carried were determined by superstition and personal desires. In the beginning of
the story we are introduced to Lieutenant Jimmy Cross. Cross is in love with a girl named Martha,
and carries...show more content...
Jimmy Cross carried the responsibility for his men. Cross blamed himself for the death of Ted
Lavender. They all carried Ghosts. They all carried the weight of their memories. They carried
each other, the wounded and weak. By daylight they took sniper fire, at night they were mortared,
but it was not in battle, it was just an endless march, village to village, nothing won or lost. They
marched for the sake of the march. They carried their own lives. For the most part they carried
themselves with poise, a kind of dignity. Now and then, however, there were times of panic, when
the squealed or wanted to squeal but couldn't, when they twitched and made moaning sounds and
covered their heads and said "Dear Jesus" and flopped around on the ground and fired their
weapons blindly and cringed and sobbed and begged for the noise to stop and went wild and made
stupid promises to themselves and to God and to their mothers and fathers, hoping not to die. They
carried the burden of wanting to run or stop running, the burden of hiding and being cowards in
front of their fellow soldiers. This was one of the heavier burdens. They carried their shameful
memories. They carried their reputations. They were too frightened to be cowards.
"For all the
Get more content on HelpWriting.net

2. Things They Carried: Summary
In "The Things They Carried"A team of Soldiers In the jungle of Vietnam, team was Jimmy
Cross,Norman Bowker, Rat Kiley,Mitchell Sanders, Henry Dobbins, and Kiowa.Brien talks about
how enemies and friend are alike and different and a friend in the campo curt lemon who made the
dentist pull a good tooth out,And with Henry Dobbins smelled his girlfriend pantie hoes because it
reminds him of memories. O'Brien never really went to church he believed but never wanted to
go.O'Brien talked about the man he killed with the man's jaw in his throat and cheek with with
three slashes into it the boy was laying in tiny blue flowers. With killing a man come the guilt but
tries to forgive himself.Later O'Brien's Daughter Asked him if he ever killed anyone
Get more content on HelpWriting.net

3. The Things They Carried Essay example
Nikita Keenan 7/14/12 Throughout Tim O'Brien's novel, The Things They Carried, the persona of
the author often serves as a medium between the translation of emotion felt by characters in the
story to the reader of the book. By developing fictitious versions of events that transpired while
serving in the Vietnam War, O'Brien's character is able to revive memories from the past as well as
spark feelings of understanding and empathy in others. Surprisingly, the tone of the narrator rarely
peals away from being passive and humorous, despite the tragic scenes that unfold within the story.
Feelings of sorrow and regret intertwine passages in the novel but are never directly addressed, thus,
the author's character seems to be reserved about...show more content...
Many of the words that soldiers used to describe their surroundings and themselves had negative
underlying meanings and many of the platoon members and O'Brien (p.54) believed it wasn't fair
that they were out fighting a war while everyone else was back home. The implementation of new
words and phrases into the story gave the setting a more authentic feel and added depth to the
characters in the book. After reading O'Brien's book, one sentence that really stuck out to me was
earlier in the story (p.39) when the narrator was describing the huge burden that the soldiers not only
of his platoon, but everyone in the Vietnam War carried. "They carried the sky. The whole
atmosphere, they carried it, the humidity, the monsoons, the stink of fungus and decay, all of it, they
carried gravity." The construction of the sentence starts off with a statement that is short but
appropriately signifies the epic task at hand. Furthermore, the abruptness of the statement creates
momentum for more descriptions to be added later in the sentence. O'Brien begins to list off several
grand things such as the atmosphere and gravity which are both obviously impossible to carry and
the difficulty of each soldiers job is further magnified to an unimaginable level. This rather long
sentence is the most effective found throughout the story because it perfectly describes what every
character in the book is feeling and justifies the
Get more content on HelpWriting.net

4. Essay on The Things They Carried
The Things They Carried
The Things They Carried, by Tim O'Brien, is a generalization of his own experiences in Vietnam
although the story itself is a work of fiction there is still much to be learned from it. Through the
actions of soldiers in The Things They Carried we can begin to explore the effect war has on the
human condition and the toll it plays on their minds.
Some of the themes in the book, The Things They Carried, are bravery and what true bravery is,
truth and how the manipulation of truth is sometimes necessary and how truth can be molded or
distorted through memory, and lastly, the demoralizing effects of war on the human condition. These
themes are all played out through the actions of the main character, Lieutenant...show more content...
"Awkwardly, the men would reassemble themselves, first in private, then in groups, becoming
soldiers again. They would repair the leaks in their eyes... light cigarettes, try to smile, clear their
throats and spit and begin cleaning their weapons."(O'Brien 860). From this passage we see how
the men hid their feelings from each other. Often when coming close to death the men defuse the
tension by joking, saying things like "that's sure as hell was close" or "I almost shit my
paints"(O'Brien 860) and pretend like the war doesn't bother them. All the solders are trying to
portray a stereotypical image of a "tough guy" because that's what they have been culturally
conditioned to think. When in fact bravery is the ability to stand up for what you believe in despite
what others think. For instance, it takes a lot more courage to allow yourself to cry in front of your
peers. A coward hides his emotions because he's afraid of what others might think.
Jim also struggles with the nature of truth and feels that events can become more real in a story
than in reality, as if by turning the memory into a story makes it more concrete and committed to
one version. And in the process of telling the story all the men can come to an agreement of what
happened and add to it. Sometimes things happen so fast in life that they don't really happen until
you go over them in your mind and set down the facts and details, finalizing the version in your mind
of what happened. And
Get more content on HelpWriting.net