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The Things They Carried Death Analysis

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Death: the inevitable, but vital part in the circle of life. It 's something nobody ever wants to face or speak of; the question remains, how does one deal with death? In “The Things They Carried” there are several examples where the main character, Tim O 'Brien encounters the hardships of death. O 'Brien shares that his first experience with death occurred when a former classmate named Linda, died due to a brain tumor. O 'Brien tells his audience how he learned to adapt and cope with losing Linda by dreaming of a universe where they could somehow still be together, even if it’s only a figment of his imagination. O 'Brien also learns how others can cope with death in a way most wouldn 't ever think, humor. In the novel, “The Things They Carried”, O 'Brien shows how his comprehension of death develops throughout the novel and how he gains understanding of how others like Kiowa deal with death …show more content…

It is in the last chapter of the novel, The Lives of the Dead, in which the audience finally finds out about O 'Brien 's first glimpse at death, which was when he was in the 4th grade, and a girl he was infatuated named Linda died. O 'Brien had fallen in love with Linda, he confesses that she was terminally ill and died from a brain tumor. O 'Brien depicts the emotions that he had as a fourth grader dealing with death. He communicates that, "it didn’t seem real. A mistake, [he] thought. The girl lying in the white casket wasn’t Linda. For a second [he] wondered if someone had made a terrible mistake" (O’Brien 241). O 'Brien 's way of dealing with her death was to dream; he dreams of memories that he and Linda had shared and adapts them to real life circumstances of them being young and in love. O 'Brien even dreams of having more dates with Linda to keep

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O’Brien shows readers and those who know veterans, how moments of morality and shame and guilt arise in war. The chapter “In the Field” shows many moments of shame and guilt for the characters as the result of a death. In the chapter Kiowa dies from sinking into the mud, and his friends are

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During times of war, soldiers would encounter death left and right, either if it were their friends or enemies. As a result, many people, including the characters in The Things They Carried, had been scared physically and emotionally due to the death of allies or enemies. Many people deal with their emotions in different ways, some in positive ways and some in negative ways. Characters such as Tim O’Brien, Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, and Norman Bowker were haunted by the deaths of the people around them, and dealt with their grief by internalizing their feelings, getting rid of distractions, and talking to imaginary people. Tim O’Brien is haunted and is reminded by his past actions because he killed what he thought was an innocent young man.

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His coping mechanism that he uses is through his writing about the Vietnam War. He is writing because he is trying to deal or understand what happened in the war. In the chapter “The Lives of the living Dead”, explains that through O’Brien’s writings, he able to come to peace at what he observed and did in combat. He may not understand why events had happened because he has not remembered the most traumatic experiences clearly. Even if his friends are dead, he will be able to remember them and his surviving platoon, through his stories to immortalize them.

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After she died that had a huge effect on Obrien and he had a hard time getting over her death because he could not find a coping method. Linda’s role was so important because it encouraged Obrien to find a coping method for the empty hole he had in his heart that he was feeling .Linda forces Obrien to use his writing to cope with her death, by telling stories with the memories he had with her, keeping her name

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O'Brien talks about how a person can be courageous during one moment and then it's gone in another. In the chapter '' On the Rainy River,'' O’Brien, went to Vietnam but before then he almost went to Canada instead. What stopped him was fear. '' All those eyes on me…I couldn't risk the embarrassment . .

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O’Briens intended audience is people who have an interest in war, and uses mortality and death, along with morality to help the audience get a deeper understanding of what could possibly occur at war. First, O’Brien discusses how mortality and death greatly affected many of the men around him. In the chapter ” In the Field” Kiowa is gone and there is nothing they could do to save him. The

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Even after all these years, O’Brien is still unable to get the images of Vietnam out of him head, specifically of the man he killed. In the novel, he repeats the description of the man numerous times, almost to the point of excess, saying,“he was a slim, dead, almost dainty young man of about twenty. He lay with one leg bent beneath him, his jaw in his throat, his face neither expressive nor inexpressive. One eye was shut. The other was a star-shaped hole” (124).

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The use of a ‘dead’ end shows that the thought of dying is on his subconscious. It also ties in with the warmth spilling out as he becomes cold just a dead body would. In summary, the images O’Brien uses in this passage are very much surreal and no doubtedly prove that he uses surrealism in his work. He does so in a meaningful manner to give insight to his character’s subconscious thoughts just as the definition

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These stories shine light on Tim O’Brien as he deals with death in the face of

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As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner “She would tell me what I owed to my children and to Anse and to God. I gave Anse the children. I did not ask for them. I did not even ask him for what he could have given me: not-Anse. That was my duty to him, to not ask that, and that duty I fulfilled.

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Death, especially of a close family member or friend, can cause one to lose hope. Death could include a loss of a loved one, a loss of oneself, or a loss of a passion. In The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien reveals the significance of death each soldier must come to terms with and the impact that death has on them, their character, and their actions. Each soldier carries objects that represent who they are, what they long for, and what they love. This is what remains constant for the boys in a world of war and death.

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He dreams of her so that he can pretend she isn’t dead and feel relieved for a few hours. When she died of cancer when he was young; he was heartbroken and did not want to come to terms with her being dead. He thought through his adolescent years that Linda was invincible. He mentions that one time Linda had asked him to stop crying, showing how much he cared for her and how badly he missed her. So he constantly dreamed of her so that he could see her and make him feel happy for small moments.

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Towards the end of the book, O 'Brien talks about the mental change the war creates in your mind that never lets you completely bounce back to civilization. On page 208 and 226, the author explains two strategies the soldiers use to keep themselves sane in Vietnam. They use language tricks, turning miles of marching in the pitch dark was called the “night life”, a burnt body became a “crunchie munchie” or a “crispy critter”; “If it isn’t human, it doesn’t matter much if it’s dead.” On page 215, Tim is new to the war and he hasn’t developed the humor the rest of the guys have, like shaking hands with dead bodies to make the deaths seem less real. The author’s friend, Kiowa, says, “Well, you’re new here.

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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.

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Obrien keeps the deceased characters Linda, Kiowa, Ted Lavender, Curt and Timmy alive, through his memories, dreams and stories. In Tim O’Brien’s “Lives of the Dead,” the loss of innocence and the power of literacy are both prevalent themes. Symbols are often used in a story to mean more than its literary meaning; Linda’s red cap, in “Lives of the Dead,” is a symbol of innocence’s. Linda’s innocence affected neither her illness nor death. Linda was O’Brien’s childhood girlfriend; when she first found out she was sick and had cancer, she began to wear a red cap, every day.

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