Continuing to Be Affected by the Vietnam War: "The Things They Carried" and "Regret to Inform"

War changes the lives of each and every soldier who participates. It continues to change the way they experience events and the way their perception of the simplest things. Many veterans do not realize what truly happened until much later in life, if at all. Many live in denial of the truth, consciously or subconsciously, and many continuously remember their darkest moments. This is the case in “Salem”, written by Robert Olen Butler. The short story is about a man, late in life, recalling a past event from the Vietnam War. He remembers a man, alone in a clearing, whose life he ended. He starts to understand his actions and their true outcomes. The author uses symbolism, setting, and character to enhance the idea that one should always be aware of how his/her actions affect others.

Written by author Tim O’Brien after his own experience in Vietnam, “The Things They Carried” is a short story that introduces the reader to the experiences of soldiers away at war. O’Brien uses potent metaphors with a third person narrator to shape each character. In doing so, the reader is able to sympathize with the internal and external struggles the men endure. These symbolic comparisons often give even the smallest details great literary weight, due to their dual meanings. The symbolism in “The Things They Carried” guides the reader through the complex development of characters by establishing their humanity during the inhumane circumstance of war, articulating what the men need for emotional and spiritual survival, and by revealing

In The Things They Carried, Tim O 'Brien uses a variety of stories to explain the life experiences that he and many of his fellow soldiers endured during a single year in Vietnam. He tells these stories in a way that we can connect to these experiences. We never spent time in Vietnam, but O 'Brien wants us to feel like we were there. O 'Brien uses what he calls "story-truth" to write these stories. The outcome or the people may be different but the feeling is real; that 's the truth in the story, the feeling. He wants us to feel what he felt, see what he saw. He doesn 't just tell us what was happening exactly; he tells a fictional story that conveys the same emotion. He plays with the truth, that 's the reason why this book is a work of

The Things They Carried is a collection of stories about the Vietnam War that the author, Tim O’Brien, uses to convey his experiences and feelings about the war. The book is filled with stories about the men of Alpha Company and their lives in Vietnam and afterwards back in the United States. O’Brien captures the reader with graphic descriptions of the war that make one feel as if they were in Vietnam. The characters are unique and the reader feels sadness and compassion for them by the end of the novel. To O’Brien the novel is not only a compilation of stories, but also a release of the fears, sadness, and anger that he has felt because of the Vietnam War.

The Vietnam War began in 1954, consisting of many extensive, horrific years of battle that seemed to create more harm to the United States and its soldiers rather than to North Vietnam. The 500,000 United States military personnel returned home with the loss of the war and the loss of their friends on their minds. Although the physical and emotional experiences that the men went through is unfathomable, Tim O’Brien does a great job portraying what life as a soldier was truly like in the Vietnam War. In the book The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien depicts the unstable emotional and psychological condition of the American soldiers through the symbolism of their belongings and personal anecdotes from their lives.

"The Things They Carried," is a story about drafted soldiers during the Vietnam era who were sent to the Vietnam War. The author, Tim O’Brien, describes the things that the men carry during their tour of duty. The items carried are both physical and impalpable items and what these things are is subject to the individual soldier. They carry the necessities for survival in the jungles of Vietnam as well as the personal things each soldier feels necessary to make life as comfortable as possible. Additionally, each of the men carries the memories and fears of past and present experiences. The heaviness of the impalpable items is as tangible as that of any physical item, and not so easy to cast away. The literary argument in which the novel

The text, ‘The Things They Carried', is an excellent example which reveals how individuals are changed for the worse through their first hand experience of war. Following the lives of the men both during and after the war in a series of short stories, the impact of the war is accurately portrayed, and provides a rare insight into the guilt stricken minds of soldiers. ‘The Things They Carried' shows the impact of the war in its many forms: the suicide of an ex-soldier upon his return home; the lessening sanity of a medic as the constant death surrounds him; the trauma and guilt of all the soldiers after seeing their friends die, and feeling as if they could have saved them; and the deaths of the soldiers, the most negative impact a war

Various reasons explain why Vietnam vets had become psychologically ill. Coleman believes it was a lack of leadership, support, and trust. Troops were trained to believe the Vietnamese were below Americans and they were just ‘gooks’ (74). One by one each veteran tells their story in the documentary “Winter Soldier,” and the same story is told in different words. In the moment of war the men were persuaded to believe what they were doing was for the good of their country (Lesser). Soldiers were left to feel as if they were sent to

In “The Things They Carried” Tim O’Brien uses this story as a coping mechanism; to tell part of his stories and others that are fiction from the Vietnamese War. This is shown by using a fictions character’s voice, deeper meaning in what soldier’s carried, motivation in decision making, telling a war story, becoming a new person and the outcome of a war in one person. Tim O’ Brien uses a psychological approach to tell his sorrows, and some happiness from his stories from the war. Each part, each story is supposed to represent a deeper meaning on how O’Brien dealt, and will deal with his past. In war, a way to

The war had changed people in so many ways, as their former character of being sincere, at peace, and loving was slowly changed to chaotic, indecisive and unhopeful lives. People began to forget who they really were all due to the war, “It

In "The Things They Carried," O'Brien made reference to the Vietnam war that was closely associated with the physical, psychological, and emotional weight the soldiers beared.  The overall method of presentation of this story incorporated many different outlooks on the things the soldiers carried, dealt with, and were forced to adapt to.  In addition to this, O'Brien showed us the many reasons why and how the soldiers posessed these things individually and collectively and how they were associated directly and indirectly.  The strong historical content in "The Things They Carried" helped emphasize the focus of the story and establish a clearer understanding of details in the

The Vietnam War. A war that many Americans believed unfair and unnecessary. “Why am I being sent off to fight in a war I don’t know anything about? Will I ever return again?” Many draftees asked themselves these questions hoping to find comfort in the answers. But there was little to no hope, and they knew it. They were being drafted and they could do absolutely nothing about it, only hope that at the end they would be returning to the enlightened faces of their loved ones, something that not many Vietnam soldiers expected to ever see again. The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, portrays his experience in the war along with his fellow squad members, in their fight for survival against the Vietcong. In The Things They Carried, each

After the Vietnam War, soldiers suffered from posttraumatic stress disorder in countless numbers. The trauma they saw, endured, and witnessed forever changed and scared their lives. Men, like Tim O'Brien the author of the novel The Things They Carried, suffered from posttraumatic stress disorder and it took them years to regain their lives after their return home. In the excerpt from his novel, O'Brien shows the reader how the men endured this mind-altering experience in the jungles of Vietnam through the details of all the items the men carry.

The wartime lives of the soldiers who fought in the war were in a state of mind of mixed feelings. Happiness and devastating are two adjectives that can describe the soldier’s feelings in the war because at one second they can be happy that they succeeded on a mission, but on the other hand, it can be very devastating because one of their own soldiers could have been killed during the war. Aside from physical danger losing one of your own soldiers or having your family worry about you every day and night are some negatives and unpleasant parts about fighting in a war. For example, soldiers loved ones worried each day, and hoped that they would not get a knock on their door by someone who was going to tell them that their fathers, husbands, sons, or brothers have died in the war.

“The Things They Carried” by Tim O’ Brien is a story in which the author details the possessions the emotions and the memories which were carried by the soldiers into the Vietnam War. The accuracy fact fullness and the attention to details make this story a truthful experience, riding on a thin line between fiction and a reality. It embodies the transformation that a soldier in a war zone undergoes. The author being a war veteran himself captures the events in a vivid manner. The two works of literature serve as an authentic and knowledgeable depiction of men fighting a war. They not only carry the weight of weaponry and ammunitions and supplies needed but also the weight of the struggle and the violent deaths that surround them which weigh heavier than the items they carried. The outcomes of war for the side that wins or loses results in devastation of the people but the soldiers are the ones who carry with them the memories of pain and struggle long after the war ends. Every war is partly fought on the ground and partly in the mind of soldiers.