What is surrealism? How do you know what’s real or unreal? Sometimes when authors write we can’t tell if it's real or more of an exaggeration. We can't really understand the truth. In the novel ‘’The Things They Carried’’ by Tim O’Brien is about the Vietnam War and his experiences with it. It’s more of knowing whether what is being told to us is true or surreal. In the chapter how to tell a True war story, rat Kiley introduces us to Curt Lemon, his best friend and he makes the readers think about if the story is true or not. For example when curt lemon died and rat Kiley was telling the story of how his death came. rat Kiley said when he died it was almost beautiful. “The way the sunlight came around him and lifted him up and sucked him high into a tree full of moss and vines and white blossoms [67]” The way he said that made the readers think if it was true or more of “it happened so fast and I don’t want to remember it so I’m going to make up things “or more of an exaggeration. ‘’ in many cases a true war story cannot be believed if you believe it be skeptical. It’s a question of credibility. Often the crazy stuff is true and the normal stuff isn’t because the normal is necessary to make you believe the truly …show more content…
It’s scarier than I would imagine sometimes it could make you do things you would never imagine yourself doing. If you would ever ask me what I think about the Vietnam War or what I think about it. I would tell you to me it’s a different life and you’re a different person as soon as you walk into it and out of it. ‘’they carried the soldiers greatest fear which was the fear of blushing men killed and died because they were embarrassed not to it was what had brought them to war in the first place nothing positive no dreams or glory or honor’’[20] You won’t come back the
In Tim O’Brien’s novel, The Things They Carried, he uses metafiction by writing about how he made up most of the stories. The stories of his experiences from the Vietnam war in his book, create a war-like perspective for his readers to better understand war because often, battles can be spotty in the mind and the imagination fills the gaps. O’Brien uses his book to help the reader find truth. Many things in The Things They Carried are confusing and contracting.
Tim O’Brien never lies. While we realise at the end of the book that Kiowa, Mitchell Sanders and Rat Kiley are all fictional characters, O’Brien is actually trying to tell us that there is a lot more truth hidden in these imagined characters than we think. This suggests that the experiences he went through were so traumatic, the only way to describe it was through the projection of fictional characters. O’Brien explores the relationship between war experiences and storytelling by blurring the lines between truth and fiction. While storytelling can change and shape a reader’s opinions and perspective, it might also be the closest in helping O’Brien cope with the complexity of war experiences, where the concepts like moral and immorality are being distorted.
Tim O’Brien that signifies the use of literary acuity in explaining the beauty of his piece of art. Considering the book, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, the book lays bare stories, especially of experiences a soldier may go through in war; and that is the standpoint of the piece of art. A number of themes are brought out clearly by the book as per the author’s storytelling prowess; however, the principal theme that is explored in Tim O’Brien’s literary work includes the war storytelling portrayals (O’Brien 9). In regard to this, the book plays a vital role in determining the real picture of the accurate portrayals one may endure during the time of war. Therefore, accurate portrayals are descriptions, facts, and analysis of a given
Therefore, the non-linear line here may in fact be more true than the “truth.” a war story should not be told neatly because it probably didnt fashion out that way. Getting the raw thoughts and emotions in that sense is giving you a more inside view to the character and his
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.
This is also true of Tim O’Brien as he narrates from Vietnam, in the midst of the Vietnam war, how to tell a true war story. As readers find out though, a true war story is not always true, and “cannot be believed. If you believe it, be skeptical” (O’Brien 3). Through various memories, O’Brien proclaims that if one is going to tell a war story, although it is ironic, they must insert lies to make the truth sound real. He explains that “often the crazy stuff is true and the normal stuff isn’t because the normal stuff is necessary to make you believe the truly incredible craziness” (O’Brien 3).
According to O’Brien, you only “tell a true war story” “if you just keep on telling it”.(The Things They Carried 91). For O’Brien it is not the facts that makes a story worth remembering, but that a story becomes part of the present so “there is nothing to remember except the story”( The Things They Carried
In Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, the author retells the chilling, and oftentimes gruesome, experiences of the Vietnam war. He utilizes many anecdotes and other rhetorical devices in his stories to paint the image of what war is really like to people who have never experienced it. In the short stories “Spin,” “The Man I Killed,” and “ ,” O’Brien gives reader the perfect understanding of the Vietnam by placing them directly into the war itself. In “Spin,” O’Brien expresses the general theme of war being boring and unpredictable, as well as the soldiers being young and unpredictable.
In the chapter, How to Tell a True War Story, he emphasizes this a lot. “In many cases a true war story cannot be believed. If you believe it, be skeptical. It’s a question of credibility. Often the crazy stuff is true and the normal stuff isn't, because the normal stuff is necessary to make you believe the truly incredible craziness.”
O’Brien goes into great depth in this small quote on how loss of innocence and war can affect people in the war. The quote “Often the crazy stuff is true and the normal stuff isn’t” shows how war is so different from what any human experiences at home. After that small quote he follows it up by bringing up how you have to use normal stuff to show how crazy these things are and how much of a pole it can have on somebody during a war. The way that war is treated for many is mostly the mental part that is struggling. But for many "War is hell, but that's not half of it, because war is also mystery and terror and adventure and courage and discovery and holiness and pity and despair and longing and love.
This technique is supported when he includes Rat Kileys narration in his story, while all at once, allowing the reader to understand that Kiley is known for embellishing. “The question is not of deceit. Just the opposite: he wanted to heat up the truth, to make it burn so hot that you would feel exactly what he felt” (Kaplan 5/8). By O’Brien allowing Kiley to express his view of the war, he further sustains the writing technique used to reinforce the belief that with numerous narrations, he provides the audience the opportunity to depict and imagine their own reality of the war. The war stories told through each individual soldier’s perspective, but more significantly, with their own emotions towards the war and the events which occurred during the war.
“A thing may happen and be a total lie; another thing may not happen and be truer than the truth” (83). The theme of “happening-truth” versus “story-truth” is a constant opposition Tim O’Brien uses to convey his “true war story” to his audience. Many times in the book The Things They Carried, O’Brien lies to the reader to attempt to give the reader realistic events, so they can relate to the emotions O’Brien felt during the Vietnam war. O’Brien makes it clear in the chapter “Field Trip” that a person who has not been to war cannot comprehend what it was like. He uses a fictional character, Kathleen, to be a stand in for the reader; she is innocent and free from the burden of serving in wartime.
Tim O’Brien’s writing, in the book, The Things They Carried, reflects the surreal nature of war. Tim O’Brien uses surrealism in almost every chapter in the book. Surrealism is like something that happens but it seems like whatever happens cannot be true, like something almost bizarre that happens. In the chapter, “How to Tell a True War Story”, Tim O’Brien uses surrealism in about all of the stories in the chapter, but there was one story that stuck out from the rest.
There are numerous examples of metafiction in The Things They Carried; many are clear, and some are harder to notice at first glance. In the text, author Tim O’Brien uses a metafictional writing style to vividly illustrate what emotions and thoughts went through the minds of the soldiers fighting in Vietnam, including himself. It is unclear whether or not some of the stories he tells in the text actually happened, but there is no doubt that they are paramount to the underlying objective of O’Brien’s writing style: to use realistic scenarios that may not have actually happened, to make whatever changes necessary to the story to get his point across. Tim O’Brien uses metafiction to obscure the line between truth and fiction by manipulating details that trigger certain emotions to influence the reader. Metafiction allows writers like Tim O’Brien to manipulate what is held to be truth, and fabricate certain details in an attempt to enhance or reinforce the meaning of a story.
The chapter “How to Tell a True War Story” in the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien main focus is that in war stories, not everything is accurately told or explained. But even with this, the feelings of the soldiers can still be completely true. A surreal story is when a story is exaggerated or is not completely true, to express the true feelings that went on in the story. On pages 74 to 76, the narrator tells about an incident with a baby VC water buffalo and the soldier Rat Kiley . At first Rat Kiley took care of the animal by trying to feed it and being kind to it, but the buffalo would not eat any of the C rations.