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Tim O 'Brien's The Things They Carried'

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The Lives of the Dead. In October of 2012 I visited the Vietnam Memorial in Washington DC. I walked down the ramp examining the wall and the list of names on it. As we searched for the name of a friend of my Grandfather, an army veteran that served with him in Vietnam. I couldn’t help but feel a sense of despair. It is one thing to read the number of casualties, it is another to look at the names of the men we lost. It has been over 40 years since the end of the Vietnam War, yet the pain of this conflict is as real for those who experienced it Today as it was when they were there. If time heals all wounds, then how much will pass before atonement has been achieved? The book The Things They Carried is one man’s struggle to come to terms with the pain he experienced and caused. If you asked someone what the topic of the book is they would probably tell you that it is about war. They would be mistaken, The things they carried is a book about love and loss. Across the entire book the stories “The Things They …show more content…

It also details the death of one of his fellow soldiers, Tim Lavender. Killed while separated from the rest of the men by a sniper. His death is taken harshly by the platoon’s leader a young Lieutenant Cross. Cross was distracted by personnel effects given to him by a woman he cared for named Martha back in the United States. While it is unlikely that Lt. Cross could have saved Lavender even without the personnel effects, he blames himself for the loss of one of his men. His bitter experience, a combination of self-hatred and sorrow at the loss of a comrade hardens him. As a form of atonement, he destroys all the letters and pictures he has of Martha. Lt. Cross re-dedicates himself to his current predicament allowing no distractions to enable the loss of another of his

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    The book The Things They Carried was a book about a platoon of American Soldiers in the Vietnam War. Tim O'Brien wrote the book as the Author. Published on March 28 1990, with 233 pages. In the book the men had set up camp, which later found out to be a sink hole. The moltar started coming off the camp.

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  • Lieutenant Jimmy Cross In The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

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    The transformation of Lieutenant Cross from a lovesick young man to a hardened commanding officer is slow, but steady. At first Cross is reading Martha's letters each night and imagines what she is doing. However, Cross begins to doubt Martha's love for him. And it is this distraction that results in the death of the soldier.

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  • Transformation Of Lt Cross In The Things They Carried

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    (O’Brien 460). Martha was holding him back, making him daydream and forget his responsibilities. She doesn’t love him, and he knows that all he can do is now focus on the war and his men. Cross then realizes that he and his men would need to do a better job at being soldiers.

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  • What Are The Themes In The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

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    In the book, The Things They Carried written by Tim O’brien, after effects of war are one of the main themes. Not everyone makes it out of war alive and most who do come home never go back to who they were. The Things They Carried is a novel about the Vietnam war. This novel shows different soldiers' experiences but is narrated by Tim O’Brien and mainly talks about his experience with the war. In this novel, it touches the effect war has on soldiers during the war and how death was dealt with differently.

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  • Characters In The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

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    In The Things They Carried, a war novel, by Tim O’Brien author introduces many characters. Those characters show the bitterness pain and suffering of Vietnam War caused situation. For better picture of what does the war do to young people Tim O’Brien introduces some major and minor character. Showing how they are at first represented, what kind of change do they go through and how do they end up. Different angles of viewpoint are depicted by the fact that author not only uses men to show the evolution, but also women.

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    Although sophisticated advancements have certainly changed the game of warfare, it has never been easy to carry, in any sense, for soldiers. Tim O’Brien evaluates the real burdens, both emotional and physical, of the Vietnam War in The Things They Carried. While the men of Alpha Platoon certainly are heavily weighed down in a physical sense, the mental burdens of war remain ever heavier -- as reflected in O’Brien’s title, The Things They Carried. Throughout The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien vividly represents the Vietnam War’s tangible and intangible impacts through the journeys of three characters: Jimmy Cross, Kiowa, and Norman Bowker.

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  • The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

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    The book, The Things They Carried by Tim O’brien shows us how a true war story should be told. This book follows a platoon of soldiers fighting in The Vietnam War and reveals the truth about war through their struggles. O’brien argues that “A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior, nor restrain men from doing the things men have always done. If a story seems moral, do not believe it.

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  • The Opening Chapter In The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

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    Authors tend to make their opening scene the most important because in all reality it is the first chapter that hooks the reader. To help make this scene the most important, authors add themes and interesting information to convey the reader. In The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien uses themes such as courage, guilt, and the truth of the war to project his feelings. The significance of the opening scene is used to provide background information about the characters, the war, and the things they carried so that the reader can make connections to the rest of the novel and understand what is going on in later chapters. The Things They Carried has an effective opening scene because it shows what each individual soldier carried and the physical

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    On page 3 he says “Ted Lavender, who was scared, carried 34 rounds when he was shot and killed outside Than Khe, and he went down under an exceptional burden, more than 20 pounds of ammunition, plus the flak jacket and … plus the unweighed fear.”. The soldiers would rather die than be embarrassed, they didn’t care about the honor or glory of being a hero. The narrator mentions on page 12 that “They carried the soldier’s greatest fear, which was the fear of blushing. Men killed and died because they were embarrassed not to.” They didn’t want to be there, but they could not take the easy way out and be called a coward, they had to fight through it until they got to go home.

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  • Reflective Essay: The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

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    Synthesis Essay In the Vietnam war, there were many soldiers at war with each other, and most soldiers were not prepared for the fight. In the novel The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien was in the Vietnam war when he was young. The book was not in order but he still talks about his experiences while in the war. His purpose for writing this novel was because he wanted younger audience to know what happened in the war and what the soldiers experienced.

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  • The Things They Carried: An Analysis

    688 Words  | 3 Pages

    “That’s what stories are for. Stories are for joining the past to the future ... Stories are for eternity, when memory is erased, when there is nothing to remember except the story” (36). The Things They Carried is a captivating novel that gives an inside look at the life of a soldier in the Vietnam War through the personal stories of the author, Tim O’Brien . Having been in the middle of war, O’Brien has personal experiences to back up his opinion about the war.

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  • How Does Jimmy Cross Tell The Story In Chapter 1 Of The Things They Carried

    723 Words  | 3 Pages

    For the majority of the chapter, Cross carried his mind in thoughts of Martha. He was obsessed with matters such as why she signed her letters “love”, and if she did love him or if that was just formality. Cross is unable to grieve in the ways his soldiers do; he distances himself and decides it’s better to be a leader than to be loved. The weight of the responsibility he carries for his men outweighed his love for Martha. The grieving process out-weighed his fantasies of love.

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  • Lieutenant Jimmy Cross Character Analysis

    798 Words  | 4 Pages

    One of the Lieutenant’s men, Ted Lavender, gets shot in the head while the rest of the company is distracted and Cross takes the soldier’s death personally and in result feels like a failed leader. As a result, the next morning Cross burns Martha’s letters and photographs, he swears off any further fantasies, and makes a personal vow to become a harder, crasser officer for his men. Cross becomes acutely aware to the fact that these men’s lives are in fact his to shoulder and protect, the event serves as a major reality check and turning point for the

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  • Lieutenant Jimmy Cross's Leadership During The Vietnam War

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    Lieutenant Cross decided he must remove all distractions of Martha and home and begin to focus on his responsibilities. These unexpected losses helped Lieutenant Cross recognize his responsibility and aided him to become a leader who did not let his personal life obstruct with his duties as an officer. He burned Martha’s letters and photographs and threw away her good luck charm (O'Brien). No more fantasies, he told himself. Henceforth, when he thought about Martha, it would be only to think she belonged elsewhere (O'Brien).

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  • All Is Not Fair In Love And War Analysis

    1009 Words  | 5 Pages

    Cross blames himself, knowing “He had loved Martha more than his men, and as a consequence Lavender was now dead…” (p. 121). First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross is distracted by his infatuation for Martha, which ultimately results in Ted Lavender’s death, forcing Cross to realize his fantasies for Martha are wrong and that he is not fulfilling his duties as a lieutenant. Lieutenant Cross is inattentive to the war and his responsibilities because he is unable and unwilling to stop thinking about his adoration for Martha.

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