The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien Synthesis

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O’Brien Synthesis Soldiers fought for many years. They fought through sadness and many fears. They fought with hopes of coming out alive. They fought for peace and for us to be free. In the book The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, he describes the different way war impacted him, and his Alpha brother in short stories. In the stories he elaborates vividly about the different experiences that they lived through. For instance, Tim O’Brien and Norman Bowker had things in common. Certainly they were both consumed with guilt, shame, and remorse. The war had killed them deep inside, where they no longer had sense of any emotion. O’Brien was able to fight his depression and anxiety by becoming a writer. Unlike O’Brien, Norman Bowker tired

Perhaps things could have been different if Bowkers friends were in town, or not going to school somewhere else. O’Brien states, “Sally Kramer, who picture he had once carried in his wallet was one who married” (132). And his father whom was a baseball fanatic didn’t help him. Often he didn’t have anyone around; he continues his old habits that he recalled about the war. Humping around the lake alone with no one to vent about how the war. Even with all the ribbons and a combat infantryman’s badge which he obtain through his tour with the pressure of his father. All that meant nothing; he didn’t earn them or deserved them. He felt responsible for Kiowa’s death. When he pondered about the tragic event, he recalls “the worst part, “was the smell” (139). Constantly, Norman graphic, vivid memories of how “Kiowa disappeared under the waste and water” (143), and how he felt being dragged down with him. In his mind he could had saved his life. Therefore; all that guilt and shame led Norman to hang himself. The irony that lays in his story is how he earned all these medals and ribbons that represented bravery. Moreover, his guilt led him to commit a cowardly action to end his