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Symbolism In Speaking Of Courage And Soldier's Home

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Within “Speaking of Courage” by Tim O’Brien and “Soldier’s Home” by Ernest Hemmingway there is one underlying theme, it is hard for soldiers to readjust after coming home from war. Both authors use multiple devices to illustrate this theme, the symbolism of women in the protagonist 's’ life, the conflict between the protagonists and their parents, and the juxtaposition of the protagonists against other people their age. The symbolism of women in both stories plays a role in representing the theme. In “Speaking of Courage,” Bowker, the protagonist, imagines himself telling his story to Sally Kramer. He uses the word “shitfield”(78) to describe the setting in his story, and she replies that she doesn’t “like that word.”(78) Sally is symbolic of the innocence of non soldiers. The slight dispute between her and Bowker over the word choice represents how soldiers change …show more content…

Soldiers don’t necessarily have anything wrong with their behavior, however it causes them to be outcast as rude or impolite. They don’t feel as though there is anything wrong with their behavior and struggle to adjust to what is expected of them. In “Soldier’s Home,” Krebs, the protagonist, talks about how he wants a girl but he doesn’t “want to work for her.”(85) He feels that courting a girl would include having to lie to her about his interests and experiences in order to impress her. This mirrors the way soldiers feel like they have to lie to people in order to gain their interest. Which makes them feel secluded from the rest of the world because they don’t want to lie, and because of this, they have trouble adjusting after coming home. In both stories, the protagonists have conflict with their parents, which contributes to the theme. Bowker in “Speaking of Courage” imagines telling his story to his father and after stating that he wasn’t very brave his father talks about how he has “won seven medals.” He wants to focus on

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990 Words | 4 Pages

Six o’clock tops. ”(O’Brien 138). The quote shows how Bowker’s mind was still on war, which is shown by his ability to know what time it is within the accuracy of five minutes. He also could not stop thinking about how he could have saved Kiowa, winning him a silver star medal, but instead of pulling him out he got out before he could become stuck. “Speaking of Courage” shows the weight of war and the guilt that the soldiers carry home from the war, by showing how their minds get stuck in the

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1782 Words | 8 Pages

But Tim O’brien flips those ideas upside down using the chapter “How To Tell A True War Story” in The Things They Carried. The reader learns of a young man whose best friend dies in war, and how he writes a letter to the sister about his life, only to never get one in return. Throughout this chapter, the reader learns how truly contradictory the idea of a “true war story” really is. With a reflective and didactic tone, Tim O’brien effectively teaches those who have not fought in a war how to tell a true war story-- that “a

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1292 Words | 6 Pages

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.

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730 Words | 3 Pages

In the novel The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien expresses to the reader why the men went to the war and continued to fight it. In the first chapter, “The Things They Carried,” O’Brien states “It was not courage, exactly; the object was not valor. Rather they were too frightened to be cowards.” The soldiers went to war not because they were courageous and ready to fight, but because they felt the need to go. They were afraid and coped with their lack of courage by telling stories (to themselves or aloud) and applied humor to the situations they encountered.

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1398 Words | 6 Pages

Tim O’Brien uses storytelling and memories to bring characters and events back to life in order to tell their story. O’Brien wants the readers to understand that even though people die and an event is no longer occurring, the event or person is not gone entirely. The Things They Carried is a book written by a man named Tim O’Brien. He is considered, “The best American writer of his generation,” by the San Fransisco Examiner.

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Present throughout the book is the theme of disillusionment. In the school, they’ve been told by their schoolmasters and parents that unless they join the war, they would remain cowards. They see propaganda after propaganda, all alluding towards the glory of battle and warfare. Out on the front, they realize that nothing was further from the truth. Their dreams of being heroes shattered, like when they compare themselves to the soldier on a poster in chapter 7.

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1106 Words | 5 Pages

Soldiers were not viewed as brave men risking their lives, and the war was seen as an unnecessary event. This type of mentality is seen in the novel with the perceptions of the soldiers. The narrator expresses the view of the time period when he states, “They were soldiers’ coats. Billy was the only one who had a coat from a dead civilian” (82). The meaning behind this is very crucial because it establishes a definite division between soldiers and civilians.

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1413 Words | 6 Pages

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

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991 Words | 4 Pages

“Soldiers Home” by Ernest Hemingway and “Speaking of Courage” by Tim O’Brien both deal with the difficulties of veterans returning home from war. Both of the protagonists, Krebs and Bowker respectively, experience trauma, which leads them on a search for self-discovery and an outlet for their pain. At the end of each story, neither of the characters wants to participate in society anymore. Despite the similarities, Norman Bowker is more forthcoming with his feelings, ultimately making him a more successful character. In addition, the similarities and differences between the authors’ styles accentuate those that occur within the characters of the stories; both authors use symbolism to show the changes in the dynamic characters over the course of the narratives.

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1375 Words | 6 Pages

In Phil Klay’s Redeployment, the war in Iraq is described as an intense masculine experience. Through the pages, the presence of women is marginal, if there is any woman in the short stories, and the reader enters in a realm of men and, more important, of what it means to be a real man. The assumption of war as a complete masculine experience might seem pretty obvious; however, Phil Klay is able to offer a crude and clear depiction of it. The author tells twelve different short stories of men who have only one thing in common: the experience of the Iraq War. But this is not simply a book about the war, but also about the consequences that this terrible experience has on the soldiers.

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679 Words | 3 Pages

Courage The dictionary definition of courage is “strength in the face of pain of grief.” Throughout the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, the common idea of courage is expressed with different meanings as each character interprets courage differently.

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911 Words | 4 Pages

The story “Soldier’s Home” by Ernest Hemmingway depicts the wounding and post-traumatic experience of the First World War of the main character Harold Krebs and his family. Like most soldiers’ experience of the war, upon return to their lives back home, their lives virtually had no more meaning to them. Krebs presents a painful realization in this manner in which he interacts with his mother. She tries to think of her son as a hero and make him feel like one by encouraging him to re-tell his tales from the war. Krebs knows that the impressions his mother is making are not authentic and she, just like the rest of his fellow town folk are tired of hearing and reading the same stories from the war (De Baerdemaeker 24).

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734 Words | 3 Pages

The attributes We all have traits that define who we are as a person. Each character in both books presented different features and some are more meaningful than the others. Courage was one of them and both aspects presented it very well. One of the illustrations in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was when Huck knew that his dad was back in town, he had to find a his way to escape and that took lots of courage because it is not an easy thing to do and not everybody that can be able to do that.

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1945 Words | 8 Pages

In Tim O’brien’s book, The Things They Carried, we see the detrimental causes and effects of the enforced stereotype of male masculinity. Tim uses many factors including the setting, characters, symbolism and other components like these to conveys his feelings and emotions. Many of those feelings and emotions derive from his personal experience in the war. The Things They Carried accurately shows what it is to struggle with the stereotypical image of a man in how it presents itself in everyday life along with its adverse and restricting effects.

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941 Words | 4 Pages

Both “Speaking of Courage” by Tim O’Brien and “Soldier’s Home” by Ernest Hemingway use the townspeople as a symbol for how society treats soldiers. The authors show this symbolism by how the townspeople treat the soldiers, how the soldiers treat girls, and how the soldiers treat the townspeople over time. The symbolism in this story gives a message to the reader to treat soldiers with respect, and not just ignore them because their story is boring or uncomfortable. In “Soldier’s Home,” Krebs’ town is one which “has heard too many atrocity stories to be thrilled by actualities” (84).

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