War is the graveyard of innocence for boys who become men through the loss of humanity. The book “Fallen Angels,” by Walter Dean Myers, is a story about Richard Perry, a young man who mistakenly joins the Vietnam War to avoid the shame of not going to college. As the book goes on Perry discovers his mistake and in the process, not only loses his innocence, but also his humanity. Wars will always be the dark parts of our history and no war is devoid of horrors that can strip anyone of everything they are, and in war soldiers must use coping mechanisms to deal with these very apparent horrors.
Have you a reader ever wondered about the realistic depiction of war: how the war is romanticized and how it can be an awful place to be? The author Walter Dean Myers shows us the depiction of the war in Vietnam the main character in the book Richard Perry a young boy from Harlem being thrown into the war because of his life at home and doesn't want to really deal with people. The book Fallen Angels is a realistic depiction of war. The book shows us some untimely deaths, graphic violence and the main protagonist inner thoughts and doubts. Through the novel Fallen Angels the depiction of war is shoved into the main characters face with graphic violence untimely deaths that occur and the
In the novel Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers, the main character is Richard Perry. In the beginning of this book, Richard was a generous and eager to start as a soldier in the Vietnam War. He soon becomes responsible and understanding of what it is like to be a black soldier in the war and how hard it can be to the other soldiers. Near the end, Richard becomes powerful and alerted near the end of the book. This character clearly relates to the theme of the book, which is age and race can impact somebody’s life a lot.
He appeals to one’s emotions by expressing the injustices faced by his people, writing, “In South Viet-Nam a half-million American soldiers and soldiers from the satellite countries have resorted to the most barbarous methods of warfare, such as napalm, chemicals, and poison gases in order to massacre our fellow countrymen, destroy the crops, and wipe out villages.” Words such as “massacre” and “barbarous” highlight the severity of these crimes, and invoke feelings of guilt and remorse in the reader.
“Mankind must put an end to war before war puts an end to mankind.” President John Fitzgerald Kennedy said to the United Nations General Assembly, on September 25th, 1961. This quote is saying that the killing of soldiers in war will soon destroy all. This relates to both stories because both soldiers regretted killing someone. In O’Flaherty’s “The Sniper” and Hardy’s “The Man He Killed” both works use plot, irony, and theme to portray the idea that war causes you to kill those you care or may have cared about.
During my reading of Fallen Angels, I began to notice the theme, and I think the theme is that War is devastating to people because it can totally mess you up psychologically and physically. Perry for example was already uncertain of his future and his knee injury already had him on edge. towards the end of the book after burning the corpses of his past comrades he lost all faith, and innocence. So the theme of the book is that war is devastating to person both mentally and
Furthermore, The idea is that supports how much value is placed upon a human life and shows the evils and cruelty of war is related The Ball Turret Gunner by Randall Jarrell, in which a soldier who spends his entire life in war only to die the same position he came into the war “fetal” state; just to be disregarded and buried in a whole. This can be compared to the metaphor used in chapter five of Catch 22. In this chapter Yossarian talks about the tight crawl space
“The Things They Carried,” by Tim O’Brien, brings to light the psychological impact of what soldiers go through during times of war. We learn that the effects of traumatic events weigh heavier on the minds of men than all of the provisions and equipment they shouldered. Wartime truly tests the human body and and mind, to the point where some men return home completely destroyed. Some soldiers have been driven to the point of mentally altering reality in order to survive day to day. An indefinite number of men became numb to the deaths of their comrades, and yet secretly desired to die and bring a conclusion to their misery. Over all, this story allows us to observe changes within the mentalities of army officers.
From 1914 to 1918 World War One occurred due to the murder of the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand, by a Serbian group named the Black Hand. Additionally, several powerful countries, including Germany, France, and Britain, established a series of alliances that amplifies the size of the war. Likewise, the war expanded by the strong nationalist beliefs of each country, therefore a countless amount of men desired to fight the war, in order to support their country. This sense of nationalism is a theme explored throughout Erich Maria Remarque's novel All Quiet on the Western Front, through the lense of a young German Soldier. The protagonist, Paul, a 19 year old soldier, explores the horrors of war through strong comradeship, the death of companions,
In war, there is a winning side and a losing side, but both suffer casualties. Afflictions are not always dealt in death and physical pain, but also emotional damage. In Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, he emphasizes war’s capabilities to change people. When Mary Anne, a sweet, innocent, all-American girl, arrives in Vietnam to be with her soldier boyfriend, change is inevitable, and she will eventually lose her naiveté. O’Brien utilizes personification, jarring imagery, hyperbole, and pathos to convey that war shatters all innocence, no matter how hard one may try to avoid the change.
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.
Hidden somewhere within the blurred lines of fiction and reality, lies a great war story trapped in the mind of a veteran. On a day to day basis, most are not willing to murder someone, but in the Vietnam War, America’s youth population was forced to after being pulled in by the draft. Author Tim O’Brien expertly blends the lines between fiction, reality, and their effects on psychological viewpoints in the series of short stories embedded within his novel, The Things They Carried. He forces the reader to rethink the purpose of storytelling and breaks down not only what it means to be human, but how mortality and experience influence the way we see our world. In general, he attempts to question why we choose to tell the stories in the way we
In the book “The Things They Carried”, Tim O’Brien admits to killing only one man during his war career, and relays it in the chapter “The Man I Killed”. In this chapter, O’Brien surveys the mangled body of the Vietnamese man he has just murdered, and desperately attempts to humanize the dead man as a coping method for his guilt. The chapter embodies a unique, and extremely detailed repetitive writing style which serves as a symbol of O’Brien’s scrutiny over his irrevocable action.
America’s war heroes all have the same stories to tell but different tales. Prescribed with the same coloring page to fill in, and use their methods and colors to bring the image to life. This is the writing style and tactic used by Tim O’Brien in his novel, “The Things They Carried”. Steven Kaplan’s short story criticism, The Undying Certainty of the Narrator in Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, provides the audience with an understanding of O’Brien’s techniques used to share “true war” stories of the Vietnam War. Kaplan explains the multitude of stories shared in each of the individual characters, narration and concepts derived from their personal experiences while serving active combat duty during the Vietnam War,
The two poems “Out, Out” and “Disabled” share similar points of view but have completely different structures. The poem “Disabled” was written in 1917 by a young man called Wilfred Owen. It expresses the bitter thoughts of a teenaged veteran who lost his legs in World War I. It describes the horrible effects of the brutal war and the hardships of disability. On the other hand, the poem “Out, Out” was written in 1916 by Robert Frost. The poem is about a child living in the hills of vermont doing wood working when he suddenly chops one of his hand off. At the end he dies a brutal death. These two poems both have an abundance of tragedy.