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Synopsis Of The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

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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. Jimmy Cross, who is the Lieutenant of the Alpha Company carries is reminders of his crush Martha, who is a girl he met in college in New Jersey. After long marches he will usually take out letters and other things he has from her and remember their first and only date they had which was going to the movies, this is a prime example of things the soldiers carry that have significant meaning to them. This is just a quick synopsis of the book and just one key character that is …show more content…

The U.S. public actually supported this idea at the time when it was first announced, they wanted to see communist power gone as much a the government. On December 1, 1969 the government held the first draft lottery since 1941, where men aged 19-26 (born 1944-1950) were called based on their birthday. During the course of the war there were plenty of people who did not support the war and did not want to be a part of it , more than 120,000 men were thought to have dodged the draft. Of those, about 30,000 went to Canada or other countries to avoid military service. Canada did not consider draft evasion a crime and welcomed the deserters into the country. One of the main characters Tim O'Brien who is based off the Author but is stated that he is still a fictional character tries to flee to Canada but backed out at the last

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At this time the man crosses to the Canadian shoreline, only twenty yards away from the boat. He turns around, bows his head away from Tim, and starts humming. At this time Tim starts to have a hallucination and is crying. He tries to jump over the boat but is unable to. “I couldn’t make myself be brave.

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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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Symbolism The symbolism in this novel can be found with what the soldiers carry, as this conveys special meaning for these soldiers. For example, one of the soldiers carried his girlfriend's pantyhose around his neck. A passage about this is on page 117 to 118, “It was his one eccentricity…

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Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried the pictures and letters from Martha as a way to remind himself what mattered to him and to get him through the war. O’brien described something that each soldier carried as a way to build their character for the readers to

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Imagine what war looks like. An image of suffering, grief, guilt, torture. The story, while set in Vietnam, is just as relevant today with the conflicts we have. Tim O’Brien, the main character, had to go through all the discomfort that comes with war. Even with all of the external and physical battles, the real conflict might just be inside the soldier.

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In Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, O’Brien is the narrator recounting his experiences as a Vietnam War veteran through the form of storytelling. After death, people and experiences fade away and are often forgotten, and the only way to keep their lives remembered is to continue to tell them through story. There were many traumatic events that O’Brien had to deal with, namely the deaths of soldiers, the vietnamese soldier he killed, and the death of his childhood friend Linda. Many of the surviving soldiers developed PTSD and had flashbacks, while O’Brien held them in and blocked away the memories, as a form of catharsis. Storytelling becomes his form of therapy, and method of preserving the lives of the deceased.

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Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried” is a novel dedicated to recounting the lives and existence of the soldiers during the Vietnam War. The author writes his novel in the form of a personal narrative written from the point of view of an infantryman during the war, with the purpose of relaying emotional and long-term impact both the tangible and intangible things had on the soldiers. By appealing to the reader’s emotions through the use of narrative, O’Brien is able to convey his purpose. In “The Things They Carried” Tim O’Brien utilizes multiple perspectives and events during the Vietnam War to illustrate the permanence of memories and emotional baggage the soldiers had to and still do carry with them. O’Brien uses personal anecdotes in his narrative to illustrate the significant impact of remembrance and memories on a person's life.

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When soldiers return home after being actively deployed, they struggle with adapting back to the real world due to having severe ptsd and depression. On the battlefield, soldiers carry things such as pebbles, letters and photographs, they serve as symbols of memories, the loss of something or someone, and their identity. The tangible items that the soldiers carried help them withstand the traumatic experiences they had to face during the war In the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, O Brien tells us all the things soldiers had to face through with their mental stability and the damage the trauma caused to the soldiers For soldiers that have experienced traumatic experiences during their deployment often find it hard to forget what they have seen You can see this as O Brien states this in his story that But the thing about remembering is that you don't forget (pg.33) It when in deployment you do and see stuff that you don't want to see but are forced to see and you will be unable to forget the things that you did to other soldiers and the things that you have seen done to other soldiers. once you experience that it will be almost impossible to forget those people and some soldiers even have nightmares of the people they have killed.

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“It was very sad, he thought. The things men carried inside. The things men did or felt they had to do.” In the short story, the author, O’Brien illustrates and depicts the physical landscapes of Vietnam as a hellscape. There’s nothing but terror, death, fear, and the emotional traumas that the men in the war carry alongside them.

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People all across the world carry a variety of objects and emotions. Specifically, in the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O’ Brien characters carry certain objects that act as coping mechanisms throughout the war. Three characters that dealt with the Vietnam War through the use of objects were Henry Dobbins, Jimmy Cross, and Kiowa. Henry Dobbins is described as being a large bodied man and that is why he is company’s machine gunner. In addition to carrying his machine gun along with the ammo strapped across his chest, he wears his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck.

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The role of story telling in Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried is almost as complex as figuring out a riddle. There are meanings hid within meanings of a story, which makes it hard to understand the importance of a specific story trying to be told. Stories not only play an important role in this novel, but also for many people in real life. Author Tim O’Brien believes that: “story telling has the power to give life to those that have passed on” (O’Brien). The concept in this novel tells a story, which is in the actual text of the novel, but there is also a hidden story within that story.

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In the first chapter, the author lists things some of the men in Lt. Cross’ corps carry. Some items were necessities and some gave the reader ideas of what kind of person one was based on their possessions. Lt. Cross carried photographs, such as a girl named Martha, playing volleyball or in front of a brick wall. Letters signed love at the end of them, and a lucky pebble from a girl he was infatuated with. From these personal items, we can clearly see that he loves this girl and keeps her close to his heart.

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Highlighting the effects of war on the personalities and actions of the characters, “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien dwells on the characters and contrasts their physical baggage with their emotional burdens in order to illustrate that the psychological impact of traumatic events weighs heavier on the minds of the soldiers than all of the provisions and supplies they shouldered. O’Brien does this by utilizing several literary devices, such as narration, point of view, characterization, symbolism, irony, and metaphor. Written from the third person point of view, the unnamed narrator discusses the inner thoughts and outer actions of Jimmy Cross, a lieutenant of an army unit in active combat in the Vietnam War. Along with their necessities

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Jordan C. John Instructor Kirsten Blodgett English 108 28 March 2022 Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried To reject the ideals of modernist literature and discuss the philosophical questions of war, Tim O’Brien wrote The Things They Carried. Within this novel, the ideals of postmodernist literature permeate each chapter as he utilizes the literary conventions to their fullest extent. Further, O’Brien explores the philosophy behind what makes a true war story vs. a moral war story, as well as what justifies the cruelty that was exhibited by soldiers in the Vietnam War, of which he served. Therefore, an analysis of the book, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, demonstrates that it is not only a postmodern novel but an invitation to discuss

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The Things They Carried is a book written by Tim O’Brien. Ultimately, it is a fictitious story about the intricate lives of the members of a platoon that fought in the Vietnam War. The members of Alpha Company, the platoon, are all vastly different, yet they are bound together by an unbreakable bond that comes with fighting side by side with one another. Throughout the novel, they each experience life changing events, which often alters their sense of self and results in a reconstructed personality. In the end, The Things They Carried is a wonderful narrative that shows its readers the complexity of personal identity, and how things like love, the values of society, and politics can all play a part in the shaping of one’s character.

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