ipl-logo

The Things They Carried Jimmy Cross Character Analysis

670 Words3 Pages

The short story “The Things They Carried”, by Tim O’Brien, is about the experience of a team of American soldiers in the Vietnam war (Julia Guance et al. 323). O’Brien fought in the war of Vietnam himself and used writing as a way to express the realities of war (322). His works are realistic, given his personal experience at war. Each soldier in the story “The Things They Carried” carry specific objects that reflect their personality and priorities. Jimmy Cross is a twenty-four-year-old, American First Lieutenant. He is madly in love with Martha, a girl back at home in New Jersey. However, it is evident she does not love him back to the same extent. On his march through Vietnam, he carries two photographs, a pile of letters, and a pebble, …show more content…

Shame and self-hatred surface when Lieutenant Cross realizes “…Ted Lavender [is] dead because he [loves] her [Martha] so much and [cannot] stop thinking about her” (326). Furthermore, the pebble that once symbolized his affection for Martha is replaced with a figurative “stone in his stomach” (332), representative of his guilt. In order to begin to remove his distracting infatuation with Martha, Cross takes the following action: “On the morning after Ted Lavender [dies], First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross [crouches] at the bottom of his foxhole and [burns] Martha’s letters. Then he [burns] the two photographs” (336). Cross’ burning of Martha’s letters and photographs is a physical representation of the transformation in his personality and priorities. Lieutenant Cross comes to realize “his obligation was not to be loved but to lead” (337). Meaning can be found in the fact that as Cross no longer carries these gifts Martha sent him, he is beginning to free himself of her distraction and the fantasy-like mindset he has. However, now he must carry the weight of the guilt of Lavender’s death and the responsibility of being a tough

Show More
Related
205 Words | 1 Pages

Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, of the Alpha Company, carries various reminders of his love for Martha, a girl from his college in New Jersey who has given no indication of returning his love. Cross carries her letters in his backpack and her good-luck pebble in his mouth. After a long day’s march, he unwraps her letters and imagines the prospect of her returning his love someday. Martha is an English major who writes letters that quote lines of poetry and never mention the war. Though the letters are signed “Love, Martha” Cross understands that this gesture should not give him false hope.

Read More
265 Words | 2 Pages

In the book “The things they carried” by Tim O’Brien is about a first Lieutenant Jimmy Cross who was in love with a girl named Martha who was attending Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey. He carries pictures and letters that she sent. Cross was a distracted soldier O’Brien states “at dusk, he would check the perimeter, then at full dark he would return to his hole” (2). After returning to his hole he would relaxed and daydream about Martha. While he was daydreaming one of his group members got shot in the head, he blames himself for the soldier’s dead.

Read More
176 Words | 1 Pages

Therefore, I think it is normal for soldiers to have some kind of souvenir from home to help them remember the good times and to take their minds off the war. Lieutenant Cross’s situation was a bit different from the other soldiers because he had became obsessed with Martha. A woman who did not love him and only thought of him as a friend.

Read More
711 Words | 3 Pages

Cross realized that Martha would never love him. When he finally realized this concept, Cross was depressed cause he spent all his time thinking about how he wanted her to love him. “On the morning after Ted Lavender died, First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross crouched at the bottom of his foxhole and burned Martha’s letter. Then he burned the two photographs.” (par. 81).

Read More
508 Words | 3 Pages

Tim O'Brien short story "The Things They Carried" is about a unit in the Vietnam War. One of the soldiers “Ted Lavender, a "Grunt" gets shot by a sniper when in route to the restroom. Meanwhile, his superior by the name of, Lieutenant Jimmy Cross points the finger at himself for the catastrophe. One of O'Brien's themes is that emotional problems on soldiers can be heavier than physical problems. Symbolically, the things the soldiers carry represented who they were.

Read More
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.

Read More
593 Words | 3 Pages

Tim O’Brien short story The Things They Carried embodies the conflict, emotions and burdens soldiers carry in the time of war. O’Brien uses list to describe items soldiers carry and how those items, whether military items or personal items, influences physical strengthen, weak-ness, emotions and symbolic attributes. Tim O’Brien’s character’s carry “Things” that are both literal and fugitive in nature. Each soldier carries or “hump” O’Brien (1990) heavy physical military items. Lt. Jimmy Cross carries “A compass, maps, code book, binoculars, .45 caliber pistol, a strobe light and the re-sponsibility of his men…” (O’Brien, 1990)

Read More
1009 Words | 5 Pages

Cross blames himself, knowing “He had loved Martha more than his men, and as a consequence Lavender was now dead…” (p. 121). First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross is distracted by his infatuation for Martha, which ultimately results in Ted Lavender’s death, forcing Cross to realize his fantasies for Martha are wrong and that he is not fulfilling his duties as a lieutenant. Lieutenant Cross is inattentive to the war and his responsibilities because he is unable and unwilling to stop thinking about his adoration for Martha.

Read More
1368 Words | 6 Pages

This shows that he is mad at himself for thinking about her and making her his number one priority over his men. That’s why he burned those letters to try to forget about her. Jimmy Cross holds himself more accountable for the deaths because he is the lieutenant and thinks it's his job to keep them all safe even though he wants nothing to do with war. Cross believes that he has let his men down when they die because all he can do is think about Martha and how she is from another “world” and how her life seems to be better than his. She is naive or rather uneducated about the things happening in the

Read More
934 Words | 4 Pages

Tim O’Brien states, “Lavender was now dead, and this was something he would have to carry like a stone in his stomach for the rest of the war” (O’Brien 16). In this quote, Tim O’Brien explains that since Jimmy Cross blames himself about Ted Lavender’s death, he will always be in lieutenant’s head. Thus, the lieutenant will always feel the guilt. With this, Tim O’Brien makes the reader think that Jimmy Cross is the person to blame since he is the head of the group and he has to pay more attention to his plans. Having questions about his love, Martha, in his mind instead of being careful about his men is the reason of him feeling guilty that “the lieutenant’s in some deep hurt” (17).

Read More
1516 Words | 7 Pages

William Timothy O’Brien was born on October 1, 1946. As a young man he rallied against the Vietnam war. However sometimes later he got the draft notice. He was torn between going, therefore leaving his convictions aside; or deserting and face the embarrassment he would cause to his family, friends. He decided to go, and fought in the Vietnam war.

Read More
442 Words | 2 Pages

One of the things that is always at the forefront of Cross 's mind is his unrequited love for Martha. With his love fro Martha come along fantasies, which take his mind off of the war and what 's going on around him. He thinks that because of his love for Martha, it distracted him just long enough for something serious to happen. After Lavender 's death, he tries to recollect his mind by promising himself that he would stop thinking about Martha by burning her letters and pictures that he owns. By doing this he takes the blame for the death of one of his brothers.

Read More
878 Words | 4 Pages

‘The things they carried,' a book by Tim O'Brien is a collection of many short stories that includes an extensive range of complex characters that revolve around a similar setting and subject. A character analysis of the book revamps the critical thinking of the readers who witness a steady development of characters from simple to complex forms as the stories forge ahead. The development of characters in the book has been focused on a physical, intellectual, emotional and social development. The book contains many characters who are represented in distinct forms due to disparate reasons that enhance the reader's grip to the plots featured. O'Brien is the most convoluted and complex character in the book, mainly because we observe him at three

Read More
819 Words | 4 Pages

Lieutenant Cross carried many things, however the most important were his letters from Martha that allowed him to create something that did not exist. As Tim O’Brien was going through the things the soldiers carried with them, he notes the letter Lieutenant Cross had from Martha, “They were signed Love, Martha, but Lieutenant Cross understood that Love was only a way of signing and did not mean what he sometimes pretended it meant” (2). There is an idea in Lieutenant Cross’s mind of the “love” that Martha has for him that is not true reality. By creating this idea he leads himself down a path of despair in which he knows

Read More
1073 Words | 5 Pages

The soldiers were shattered and traumatized by the death of their fellow brothers. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross blamed himself for the death of Ted Lavender. He might still blame himself until this day. Tim O'Brien mentions how Jimmy Cross lamented and wept, and he said, "He had loved Martha more than his men, and as a consequence Lavender was now dead, and this was something he would have to carry like a

Read More

More about The Things They Carried Jimmy Cross Character Analysis

Related Topics

Open Document