ipl-logo

Truth In Tim O 'Brien's The Things They Carried'

922 Words4 Pages

The Dentist "He kept replaying his own exploits, tacking on little flourishes that never happened" (82). Now, the question, "Which is more important—story-truth or happening-truth?" is asked. This above quote from Tim O 'Brein gently represents how a little thing called story-truth happens. The greatest difference between story and happening-truth is the simple fact that happening-truth reveals actual events that have occurred, whereas story-truth, which Tim O 'Brien, the author of The Things They Carried, heavily emphasizes, is subjectively reflecting a person 's thoughts and feelings when recounting a tale, and putting theme above all else. The importance of the two is where everything lies, where the author of the novel pushes for story …show more content…

Continuing, something to keep in mind when recounting stories of Lemon is the fact that each story is told by different individuals, and throughout the novel, the stories change and twist. For example, the excerpt of Lemon blowing up and splatting into a tree is told many different times in just a few short vignettes and sometimes told differently even from the same perspective. These twists are all "truth", everyone says it happened, everyone believes the story, but each person that tells the story tacks on his or her own little fact about the story; that 's when the truth gets muddied and clouded, therefore becoming …show more content…

The Dentist works its way into the happening-truth aspect of the novel in a different sort of way. It 's a smaller vignette, almost seemingly thrown into the novel without any purpose. Lemon 's character in the novel offers an unusual spin on the idea of bravery and courage within war. He obviously needs to show his capability to endure suffering and act bravely when adversity confronts him. He backs down in this section though and experiences discomfort, "He didn 't mind blood or pain—he actually enjoyed combat—but there was something about a dentist that just gave him the creeps" (83). After Lemon faints he is a complete mess. He sulks alone, isolated, just staring and cursing at the tent. Finally, embarrassment got the best of him—for the sake of his pride, and for the assurance that he hasn 't lost his manhood—he shows the truth, the true Curt Lemon, he reveals what he had the dentist do—Lemon walks into the dentist complaining of a toothache, and although the dentist could find nothing wrong he had the him rip out a perfectly good tooth; he reestablishes his personal pride in defeating his phobia and overcoming fainting. He does all of this in the name of manliness, and while doing so—introducing more

Show More
Related
480 Words | 2 Pages

Both of the characters in their adjacent stories have a very prominent hazard in their experience. During Greg Ridley’s short encounter with Lemon Brown, a group of street thugs overhear them talking about a treasure, and had continued to engage them in the deserted building they were located in. As written in the story, “Greg went to the window and saw three men, neighborhood thugs, on the stoop. One was carrying the length of a pipe. Greg looked back toward Lemon Brown,who moved quietly across the room to the window.’

Read More
630 Words | 3 Pages

The thugs looked over to find where the howling was coming from and Lemon Brown lunged himself at them, causing himself to roll down the stairs. The thugs went outside of the house and after awhile they left. After seeing how much Lemon Brown adored his treasures, Greg realized that his dad caring so much for him meant everything. Greg now appreciates the lectures about decisions he was trying to make. Greg’s treasure was his relationship with his father all because of Lemon Brown’s story.

Read More
319 Words | 2 Pages

So later on that day, Greg meets an old man named lemon brown. While he was talking to lemon brown and about his past. Greg changes his mind about not caring about his grades and what it means to him. In the end, he realizes that a treasure worth can be know by the people who care.

Read More
992 Words | 4 Pages

While marching west into the mountains, Obrien and the rest of the men took a break along a trail junction. Almost immediately Rat Kiley and Kurt Lemon started goofing off. Despite the seriousness of the situation the two continued to goof off and went off into the shade of giant trees. The men played a game which involved pulling the pin off a smoke grenade and passing it back and forth. Obrien then recalls Kurt Lemon stepping from the shade until the sunlight stating “His face was suddenly brown and shining.

Read More
436 Words | 2 Pages

n "The Treasure of Lemon Brown" Greg Ridley discovers the unseen value of family relationships. In the beginning of the story, Greg is selfish and seems to disregard his father's experiences and wisdom. He is so mad at his dad for lecturing him about a bad grade in math. He cannot understand why a bad grade makes his dad so upset. After his encounter with Lemon Brown, he understands how his father's anger is really love and that he is lucky to have a father who cares so much.

Read More
605 Words | 3 Pages

Like, “I traveled around, and one time I come home, and there was the letter saying Jesse got killed in the war. Broke my heart it truly did. They sent back what he had with him over there, and what it was is this old mouth fiddle and these here clippings.” (12) Lemon told Greg. Based on this evidence it demonstrates that Lemon had something meaningful, his son, but when his son died the things he had become Lemon’s treasures.

Read More
302 Words | 2 Pages

Luck Have you ever been homeless, or had a treasure that others wanted? I think that one theme in the story “The Treasure of Lemon Brown” is that you could be luckier than other people. Greg’s father dropped out of school when he was 13, and Lemon Brown is homeless and lost his wife and son. One theme in the story is that some are luckier than others.

Read More
1413 Words | 6 Pages

He could have been hurt really badly and could have even died. Instead of thinking like that he showed that he was not scared and was courageous enough to throw himself and get hurt to protect the things that he loves. “ YOU OKAY? Few bumps and bruises,” Lemon Brown said” (Myers 6). He threw himself down the star to protect and scare off the bad guys.

Read More
1190 Words | 5 Pages

As a work described as autobiographical fiction, O'Brien makes extensive use of fiction to enhance the perspective of reality in The Things They Carried, uses it mainly to achieve a desired response from the reader. To explain his view of storytelling, he considers the fact that the absolute truth may not be the best way to convey the true meaning and emotion associated with the story he wants to tell, and that substituting it with more impactful, yet fabricated experiences may be more effective. The story at face value was about Rat Kiley's pain about Curt Lemon's death. However, O'Brien intended for it to be an example of how arranging a story carefully could elicit various responses from the reader, from emotional connection to Rat Kiley, to preventing bias and generalization from the reader as they read the story. The same question that O'Brien poses in the chapter "How to Tell a True War Story" for the story of the four men and the grenade could be considered for the story of the baby buffalo too — "Is it true?"

Read More
442 Words | 2 Pages

For instance, “You really think that treasure of yours is worth fighting for?” Greg asked. “Against a pipe?” This demonstrates that he loved that treasure so much he would die for it. Lemon willing to die for the treasure which tells us a lot about Lemons character.

Read More
552 Words | 3 Pages

Greg later goes home to his dad giving him a lecture. In my opinion, it is important to be a decent human beings so that people can think good about a person. In the story “The treasure of Lemon Brown.” Greg learns something about himself and his father Through Lemons Brown's experience with his son. Lemon Brown starts to talk about his son and wife on page 25 and tells Greg a lot about his past.

Read More
571 Words | 3 Pages

By his use of grammar, the reader can tell that Lemon Brown is probably not well educated, and not a very proper person. Finally, when Lemon Brown finally shows Greg his ‘treasure’, and asks if he thinks it’s cool, Greg responds with, “Yeah, I guess so,”. Through this, the reader can definitely tell that Greg is not impressed with his treasure. He only sees a newspaper article, and not what it means to Lemon Brown. To sum it up, Walter Dean Myers could not have developed the characters well without

Read More
688 Words | 3 Pages

War was so much more than just war to O’Brien and he able to share this through his writing. " But this is true: stories can save us. ... in a story, which is a kind of dreaming, the dead sometimes smile and sit up and return to the world." (page

Read More
374 Words | 2 Pages

This demonstrates that lemon brown is showing a caring and positive relationship with Greg. Lemon Brown is nice. Another quote is, “Don’t try nothing cause I got a razor here sharp enough to cut a week into nine days.’’ This means, Lemon Brown goes through hard times and needs to defend himself.

Read More
405 Words | 2 Pages

Stephen King says “Writing good dialogue is art as well as craft”. Without a good use of dialogue and figurative language, a story can be boring and not memorable. In the short story “The Treasure of Lemon Brown”, the author uses descriptive dialogue and figurative language to create the mood, setting, and, characters. The author does this to develop the relationship between the characters.

Read More

More about Truth In Tim O 'Brien's The Things They Carried'

Open Document