The Things They Carried By O Brien: Novel Analysis

War, has be around since the beginning of time it’s a part of life. Many people are anti war, but they don’t realize war is a part of life and sometimes cannot be stopped. Since the United States won the revolutionary making our own indempendent counrty know as the USA we have been in and hand full of wars. We have the two major World Wars, World War I and World War II then followed and War that has been the most controversial war so far which is Vietnam that started in the 1960s. Vietnam was a war many people didn 't support and they took their anger out on the troops, which many of whom had now choice, but to serve. Many people didn’t understand what the soldiers were going through. A novel called "The Things They Carried" was released by

O 'Briens Novel "The Things they Carried" contains twenty two short stories some of these are fiction and some falling in the category memoir or nonfiction." The Things They Carried functions as an account of the experience of a dozen American solderis as they endured their tour of duty in vietanm war" (82).In Obriens writing "The Things They Carried" O 'brien makes sure he itemizes everything they carried into battle going from the gear they were carrying to the emotions such as fear guilt and shame. In this short story Obrien writes about his squad that mirrored his own when he was over there in Vietnam.The Letuinet of the entire company Jimmy Cross who is over come with guilt because he belive he is the one to blame over the death of Kiowa and Ted Lavender. Kiowa which was one of O 'Brien 's closest friends. Kiowa’s death was the result when the company mistakenly camps in a sewage field which become the focus point of three stories. Mitchell Sander in the story strongly influences the narrator. Mitchell is the most likeable out of the bunch a devoted soldier to justice, and friendship. From the story you could tell Sander struggled with war same with O 'Brien. In the story it gives expmales where they had to demorlize the VC to make it feel as if these people where not human at all. From the story it states " Sanders put his hand on the dead boys wrist. He was quiet for a time, as if counting a pulse, then he patted the stomach, almost afeectionatley, and used Kiowa 's hunting hatchet to remove the thumb" (489). Sanders did this to demoralize the body to make it not human this made it where soldiers would feel a little less wieghted on