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Complex Emotions Of War Rhetorical Analysis

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The Complex Emotions Of War
The amount of feelings soldiers experience during and after war affect their actions for the rest of their life. Tim O’Brien is able to explain the complexity and impact of these many emotions in his novel, The Things They Carried. The soldiers feel an unbelievable range of emotions, but the ones with the most impact are guilt and obligation. Throughout the novel, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, the themes obligation and guilt build off each other and are shown through the soldiers’ actions and emotions in different situations. In the chapter “On The Rainy River”, O’Brien shows the obligation he feels through his embarrassment and fear of dishonor. During the chapter, he talks about recieving a draft notice for the Vietnam War. He goes back and forth about whether he should flee to Canada or fight. After spending a week on the border of Canada and the U.S., O’Brien decides he’s going to go to war. While deciding, he talks about his fears and also says “I would go to war - I would kill and maybe die - because I was embarrassed not to” (O’Brien 57). The only reason O’Brien decides to go to Vietnam is because he is afraid of the embarrassment and dishonor that comes with fleeing to …show more content…

In the beginning of the chapter, O’Brien tells about a soldier that lost one of his best friends and decides to write a letter to the friend’s sister. In the letter the soldier talked about “what a great brother she had, how together the guy was, a number one pal and comrade. A real soldier’s soldier” (O’Brien 64). The soldier made sure the family knew their relative was a great guy so they could be proud of him and have a little closure. He got in touch with the family because of the significance of his friendship. The soldier felt obligated to write a letter to the family out of respect for the lost soldier and his best

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Karl Marlantes, in his book What it is Like to go to War argues that, “concepts of loyalty change…and warriors have to cope with that” (134). Marlantes supports this thesis by presenting a strong emotional appeal to the audience and supporting his appeal with ethos and logos. He mentions that he, “was facing a hard choice between duty and heart…as a unit or even ideals and loyalty to a person” (139). Marlantes uses ethos and pathos to connect the reader with sympathy and have credibility for being a part of a unit.

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Although the soldier he killed was an enemy soldier, instead of vilifying him he was able to humanize the man. O’Brien was able to describe the physical appearance of the soldier and imagine her life before war. The author was able to portray an emotional connection and made the line between friend and enemy almost vanish. This was able to reveal the natural beauty of shared humanity even in the context of war’s horror. O’Brien is able to find the beauty in the midst of this tragic and horrible event.

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This quote from “ On the River of Raining.” This quote is written by Tim O’Brien. He was describing that how he make his decisions to go on war. Even Though he wants to escape from it. This quote is very important because these is when O'Brien make his final decisions to go a war.

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At this moment, O’Brien is going through remorse for himself. He does not think that he should be forced to fight in this war when he does not believe in what they are fighting for. O’Brien believes that the war was unjust because “certain blood was being shed for uncertain reasons” (1002).O’Brien

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In the short story, “The Man I Killed,” O’Brien focuses on this to show that everyone fighting in a war has a story. He spends the story describing the man he killed and searching for justification of his actions. He carries around guilt with him because of it, and his fellow soldiers try to help him justify and come to terms with his action by saying things like, “You want to trade places with him? Turn it all upside down= you want that? I mean, be honest,” (126) and “Tim, it’s a war.

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At one point he discussed his personal feelings about the war and stated how much he had been persuaded and remained persuaded that the war was and will always be “evil” in his eyes (pg. 18). Before he’s officially in Vietnam, O’Brien meets with the military chaplain on base at

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Challenges at War Robert E. Lee once said, “What a cruel thing war is… to fill our hearts with hatred instead of love for our neighbors”. The novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien takes place in Vietnam. He and a handful of other men experience things only one can image and hope they will never have to experience again. They learn how death among them can greatly affect them, and many others. War is not an easy task to get through and these men all had different coping methods.

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O’Brien tells the readers about him reflecting back twenty years ago, he wonders if running away from the war were just events that happened in another dimension, he pictures himself writing a letter to his parents: “I’m finishing up a letter to my Parents that tells what I'm about to do and why I'm doing it and how sorry I am that I’d never found the courage to talk to them about it”(O’Brien 80). Even twenty years after his running from the war, O’Brien still feels sorry for not finding the courage to tell his parents about his decision of escaping to Canada to start a new life. O’Brien presented his outlook that even if someone was not directly involved in the war, this event had impacted them indirectly, for instance, how a person’s reaction to the war can create regret for important friends and

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This quote epitomizes the trauma caused by war. O’Brien is trying to cope, mostly through writing these war stories but has yet to put it behind him. He feels guilt, grief, and responsibility, even making up possible scenarios about the life of the man he killed and the type of person he was. This

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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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At first Mr. O’ Brien wants to flee to Canada even though he knows that he won’t be able to see his family again or that he won’t be able to come back to the states. However, when he is only twenty yards away from the border, he can’t risk the embarrassment from his hometown and the whole universe, so he goes to the war. During the war, Mr. O’ Brien figures out that the only reason that any of his fellow soldiers are at the war was so their prestige wouldn’t go down. He goes so far as to say, “Men killed, and died, because they were embarrassed not to… They died so as not to die of embarrassment.

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This quote stated by O’Brien shares how himself and other soldiers felt about the war, and how they felt like their fight and war tactact was overall useless for the United States. O’Brien also mentions that he feels frustrated that the government would let thousands of Americans' lives to end just for a war that had no benefit or meaning for the country. O’Brien is a great representative for American soldiers who served in the Vietnam War because of the emotion and frustration he felt about the war and the war’s

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(CE) Before O'Brien heard about the war, he realized the war was something he did not want to participate in. (DE) He says to himself that [he] would not swim away from [his] hometown and [his] country and [his] life. [He] would not be brave” (O’Brien 55).

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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.

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This is evident when Mr. O’Brien says, “I would go to the war – I would kill and maybe die – because I was embarrassed not to,” (pg. 57.) In the end the author realized what he must do and went back home, so he could fight in the Vietnam

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