Theme Of Death In Tim O 'Brien's The Things They Carried'

Tim O’Brien depicts some of the effects it has on them, as well as some coping mechanisms they use, in The Things they Carried. Some of the things the soldiers lose include their innocence and a few of their fellow soldiers. Everyone was affected by this differently, some felt guilt, others just pretended things were fine, or dreamt them back to life. The reactions of those experiencing loss also help define it and how powerful it can be. When Kiowa died, one of the boys felt the effects of immediate loss, leading him to believe he was to blame for his death. He felt that “he was alone. He’d lost everything. He’d lost Kiowa and his weapon and his flashlight and his girlfriend’s picture. He remembered this. He remembered wondering if he could lose himself” (O’Brien 171). Like him, many people feel very lost during hard times and question how much longer they can stay sane and handle the situation. In some unfortunate cases, when loss becomes too much, some commit suicide, or react violently. However, an alternate way of coping with loss (of lives and of sanity) that is seen in the novel is to completely ignore it. O’Brien recalls how “in Vietnam, too, [they] always had ways of making the dead seem not so dead. Shaking hands, that was one way. By slighting death, by acting, [they] pretended it was not the terrible thing it was…” (O’Brien 238). The thoughts of one of the characters portrays how much everyone

Throughout The Things They Carried, by Tim O’Brien it is difficult to separate what is fictitious, and what is true. During the entire work there are two different “truths”, which are “story truth” and “happening truth”. “Happening truth” is the actual events that happen, and is the foundation or time line on which the story is built on. “Story truth” is the molding or re-shaping of the “happening truth” that allows the story to be believable and enjoyable. It is not easy to distinguish “happening truth” from “story truth”, and at times during the novel O’brien reveals which is which. On the other hand, when the reader is blind 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

     How does death affect the behavior of people? Although death affects everyone's behavior differently, knowledge of one's imminent death is a main force behind behavioral changes. This knowledge causes emotions that motivate people to act in ways that they normally would not. In Tim O'Brien's 'The Things They Carried,'; the knowledge of death and its closeness causes the men in the story to alter their behavior by changing they way they display power, modifying emotions to relieve guilt, and by exhibiting different actions to ease anxiety.

The novel, The Things They Carried is a story of one man’s accounts resulting to his tour of duty in Vietnam. Many of the men that are discussed in the book continued to be effected by the war, long after they returned home. Men were left emotionally scared, even if they managed to get out of the war physically unharmed. The

There are many levels of truth in Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. This novel deals with story-telling as an act of communication and therapy, rather than a mere recital of fact. In the telling of war stories, and instruction in their telling, O'Brien shows that truth is unimportant in communicating human emotion through stories.

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien expresses the importance of a story-truth, as opposed to a happening-truth by use of literary elements in his writing. The novel is about war and the guilt it leaves on everyone involved in the war. Story-truth is not exactly what happened, but uses part of the truth and part made up in order to express the truth of what emotion was felt, which an important thematic element in the novel is. The three literary devices he uses to express this are diction, imagery, juxtaposition, and hyperbole. All of these elements allow the reader to identify emotion that is expressed in each story, as though that were the complete truth.

War is often thought about as something that hardens a soldier. It makes a person stronger emotionally because they are taught not show it and deal with it internally. People say that death in war is easier to handle because it is for the right reasons and a person can distance themselves from the pain of losing someone. However, there is always a point when the pain becomes too real and it is hard to maintain that distance. In doing so, the story disputes the idea that witnessing a traumatic event causes a numbing or blockage of feelings. Rat Kiley’s progression of sentiment began with an initial concern for the buffalo, transforming into an irate killing of the animal, and then ending with an ultimate acceptance of death. These

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.

Tim O’Brien’s, The Things they Carried is a riveting tale of struggle and sacrifice, self indulgence and self pity, and the intrapersonal battles that reeked havoc on even the most battle tested soldiers. O’Brien is able to express these ideas through eloquent writing and descriptive language that makes the reader feel as if he were there. The struggle to avoid cowardice is a prevailing idea in all of O’Brien’s stories.

Death is final and life is ultimately the greatest thing that anyone can lose. While reading a tragedy that mostly results in death, most of the readers would say that death is the most significant part of the story. Death is the result of the main dangers, which are often physical dangers that do happen to result in death. But the tragedy of death is typically preceded by characters succumbing to other dangers not just physical or main dangers. Just like in the story written by tim O’Brien “The Things They Carried” where a Lieutenant Jimmy Cross has to lead his men through the thick jungles of Vietnam but the Lieutenant himself is unaware that his daydreaming, a danger by the way, which is what he does a lot that will eventually lead to one of his soldiers dead. These dangers that lead to death are known as secondary dangers which happens to be a part of a character’s flaw like pride or paranoia such as in the “The Cask of Amontillado” written by Edgar Allan Poe where this story is all about a man who becomes so obsessed from a grudge no less that drove the main character insane which led to him exact revenge on his friend or “friend” . Emotional burdens can be considered secondary dangers, as Bobbie Ann Mason discusses in her essay “On Tim O’Brien’s ‘The Things They Carried.’”

The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien is a wonderful and personal look into one of this countries darkest times. The vivid imagery that the author uses lets the reader actually experience the feeling of actually being in the war. By using the cultural studies method of literary criticism, we can use the social conditions during the time of the writing to explore beneath the surface. What we find underneath just might be more interesting than the story itself.

In many respects, Tim O 'Brien 's The Things They Carried concerns the relationship between fiction and the narrator. In this novel, O 'Brien himself is the main character--he is a Vietnam veteran recounting his experiences during the war, as well as a writer who is examining the mechanics behind writing stories. These two aspects of the novel are juxtaposed to produce a work of literature that comments not only

By making a death humorous it may help you or someone else deal with the pain about the death or possibly not think of it as an actual death. Also, when thinking constantly about a person who has died, you can begin to create positive memories about that person and feel as if they are still alive. O’Brien demonstrates this in his quote, “But this too is true: stories can save us. I’m forty three years old, and a writer now, and even still, right here, I keep dreaming Linda alive. And Ted Lavender too, and Kiowa, and Curt Lemon, and a slim young man I killed, and an old man sprawled beside a pigpen, and several others whose bodies I once lifted and dumped into a truck.”, he still thinks of them alive.