Things They Carried Analysis draft
In the short story “The Things They Carried,” Tim O’brien uses the literary element of symbolism to portray how people carry different items to represent certain things, and to represent the harsh realities of war and life. He also uses symbolism to show how people become attached to items, and how they take on deeper meanings in times of stress. The story takes place during the Vietnam war, and O’Brien talks about an army detail, and the different things that they carried. This story is a great example of the use of symbolism to represent many different things at once.
In this short story, O’brien has multiple characters who are all part of the same army detail. He goes into detail explaining the different items of each character. For example, the main character, Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, carried letters and photos from Martha, a girl from his home town whom he was in love with. However, Martha doesn’t seem to return the love. Therefore, not only does this picture represent a part of his home, and something that he misses, but it represents a weakness and a yearning for something he doesn’t have. O’brien says, “They were not love letters,
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O’brien portrays this idea in his short story when he says, “The things they carried were determined to some extent by superstition. Lieutenant Cross carried his good-luck pebble. Dave Jensen carried a rabbit’s foot” (pg. 9). Throughout the story, the men are faced with different adversities, and at each turn it ends back up with O’brien talking about their different items. O’brien does this because it is a universal truth that people carry things with them that they feel can help them in times of trouble. Due to this, the story has a fairly light mood even as it talks about very grim subjects such as people dying or cutting off
Hunter Berman Ms.Silver AP English P-4 6/7/2018 The things They Carried Historical Report The Things They Carried is a novel written by Tim O'Brien about U.S. soldiers stationed in Vietnam and their personal stories of what they literally and emotionally carry. He focus on what the soldiers have on their person and how each of those items have an effect on them for reason specific to them.
Avygayle Titco English V01B Professor Carlander 02/07/18 Losing a Grip on Life Tim O’Brien’s short story, The Things They Carried, isn’t just any typical war story. He views the perspective of a soldiers eye and the intangible and tangible items they carry along the journey. Through the use of depicted details, it helps the readers feel like they are part of the battlefield. We feel like we’ve known these characters by the way O’Brien describes them with the personal items they carry.
The Soldier’s Fears First, in Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried,” the tangible items carried by the soldiers reveal their fears of losing a connection to home, fear of the unknown, fear of reality. Holding onto their precious items from home helped them hold onto reality. Second, “the soldiers all had fears of the war and they all carried with them certain items that gave them the comforts of home.” (366). “First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried letters from a girl named Martha” (366) he loved her and this was a way of keeping her close, “Henry Dobbins carried his girlfriend’s pantyhose and wrapped them around his neck as a comforter” (372) he must have felt wearing his girlfriend’s pantyhose connected her to him, “Kiowa carried an illustrated New Testament and an old hunting hatchet from his grandfather” (367) his grandfather must
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien is a novel that emphasizes symbolism in chapter 7, “How to Tell a War Story” the character/narrator Tim O’Brien expresses The struggle that affects a soldier in the war. “He shot it twice in the flanks. It wasn't to kill; it was to hurt it” (O'Brien, 75) In Chapter 7 How to Tell a war story, the story expresses the grief that Rat Kiley goes through.
Tim O’Brien’s book, The Things They Carried, is not a casual story based on war, but divided stories that paint a picture of veterans and what they were developing during and after the war. O’Brien brings up hard hitting points in each book that affects a reader in so many ways. O’Brien uses his novel with symbolisms to deeply understand characters, types of grieving each character is affiliated with, and more so what these characters carry emotionally, mentally, and figuratively throughout the book, nevertheless, making these characters relatable with actual people. O’Brien’s characters are all different, Jimmy Cross was a lieutenant who’s in love and is not desired to lead his men to fight for their own freedom and stop war. Azar is a disrespectful,
Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried is a collection of essays, all centered on anecdotes of American soldiers during the Vietnam War. The seemingly straightforward recollections slowly reveal dense layers of personal and metaphorical meanings upon closer inspection, with the exploration of the characters’ emotions and the underlying motif of love creating the opportunity to trace how war changes a person in the realm of his emotions. The Vietnam warfare acts as a catalyst for all of the unsettling changes in the soldiers’ minds, raising the question whether the battlefield is actively responsible for this result or merely accelerating the inevitable manifestation of these personal issues, inherent in every person. In the collection of essays
The title itself, “The Things They Carried,” indicates that the story is about the things they carried. Each character has their own physical burden to hump; the basics include pocket knives, dog tags, and water canteens, and some have special stuff to carry such as the medic, Rat Kiley, who carries morphine and surgical tape, or the big guy, Henry Dobbins, who carries a machine gun and ammo. Along with that, they each have emotional burdens to carry. For example, “Henry Dobbins carried his girlfriend's pantyhose wrapped around his neck as a comforter” (par. 17). Lieutenant Cross carries his love for Martha in the form of letters, a couple of photos, and a pebble sent to him from the Jersey shoreline that she found to symbolize the “separate-but-together quality” (par. 13) of their relationship.
A lot happens in Tim O 'Brien short story "The Things They Carried", at first, the reader speculates what the short story is about and why it is called "The Things They Carried". The narrator Tim O 'Brien tells and describes all the things that the men have to carry while "in-country" during the Vietnam War in the1960 's. The text 's artistic value comes from its plot, characters, conflict, and style. In the plot of the story the protagonist, Tim O 'Brien starts by describing circumstances that happened while he was in Vietnam. In the beginning of "The Things They Carried" we are introduced to each character by the things they carry.
O’Brien’s intended audience was young people who were not educated about the war and he discussed the themes shame/guilt and mortality/death. The chapter “The Things They Carried” gives an introduction about the men in the group, it also shows shame/guilt. The chapter talks about the equipment each soldier carried and how it affected them. During this chapter it focuses primarily on LT.
Tim O'Brien's “The Things They Carry,” tells a story about the lives of young men during war. The narrator tells his story from first person, marking all of his adventures and experiences of his companions. O’Brien crafts his piece through the use of repetition, symbolism, and metaphors to convey the idea of physical and psychological hardships of soldiers during war. Though the literary device of repetition, O'Brien portrays the physical and psychological hardships of a soldier.
“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.
Originally published in 1990, The Things They Carried is a collection of war stories that took place during the Vietnam War. Due to its accurate and honest depiction of war, it has been banned for crude language, violence, drug use, and sexual innuendo. The author, Tim O’Brien, was born in Austin, Minnesota in 1946. Due to his service in the United States military during the Vietnam War, O’Brien is able to depict the war in a more graphic, and realistic manner.
The Things They Carried, written by Tim O’Brien, illustrates the experiences of a man and his comrades throughout the war in Vietnam. Tim O’Brien actually served in the war, so he had a phenomenal background when it came to telling the true story about the war. In his novel, Tim O’Brien uses imagery to portray every necessary detail about the war and provide the reader with a true depiction of the war in Vietnam. O’Brien starts out the book by describing everything he and his comrades carry around with them during the war. Immediately once the book starts, so does his use of imagery.
The Things They Carried “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien is a short story set during the Vietnam War. In the story, O’Brien lists many different items soldiers in the Alpha Company carried with them as they humped across the rugged terrain. Many carried necessities such as rations, matches, ammunition and things of that nature; however, many soldiers also carried quite peculiar objects such as condoms, pantyhose, and M&Ms. Readers can grasp a closer insight of the characters’ lives after further examination of the symbolism and meaning of the things they carried.
"They varied the sky. The whole atmosphere, they carried it, the humidity, the monsoons, the stink of fungus and decay, all of it, they carried gravity." -O 'Brien. The Things They Carried by Tim O 'Brien, is about how war can destroy you, with an horrible end always. O 'Brien use the symbolism to show that war can destroy your humanity and innocence.