November 2

Blog #91 – Vietnam

Tim O’Brien’s book, The Things They Carried, focuses on the members of Alpha Company as they hump across Vietnam and also how they dealt with civilian life (“Speaking of Courage”). 

1. The things that the soldiers carried in battle were not just physical things but mental / emotional as well.  Henry Dobbins wore his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck as a comforter.  But after the war is over and done with, the soldiers, like Lt. Cross, carry guilt and pain around with them.

2. The novel is also about truth, especially with the story, “How to Tell a True War Story,” which seems contradictory in many cases.  But maybe that’s what the truth really is in a war-time environment – unclear.

3. The novel also captures loneliness and isolation experienced by the American soldiers while in the Vietnamese jungle.  Though the soldiers are surrounded by their comrades in arms, many don’t feel a connection to each other.  Could this be because they’ve been drafted into a war they don’t want to fight?  Or that war is the most loneliest experience – do or die on the battlefield?

4. How does shame or the idea of letting another person down motivate Tim and other soldiers in the stories?

“They carried the soldier’s greatest fear, which was the fear of blushing. Men killed, and died, because they were embarrassed not to. It was what had brought them to the war in the first place, nothing positive, no dreams of glory or honor, just to avoid the blush of dishonor. They died so as not to die of embarrassment.”

Pick two of the four topics to write about and also include a brief assessment of the book. 

300 words minimum for your total response.  Due by Wednesday, Nov. 9 by class (yep, Wednesday).  

Image result for tim o'brien the things they carried pdf 

Tags: ,

Posted November 2, 2016 by geoffwickersham in category Blogs

69 thoughts on “Blog #91 – Vietnam

  1. Lindsey Nedd

    I choose topics 2 and 4. Topic two was about how to tell a war story and how the truth tends to be unclear, topic four was about how shame and disappointing others motivate the men drafted for the war. As a soldier the there are two main objectives , fight for your country and don’t die. In extreme environments like Vietnam under the circumstances of being a soldier in a foreign area things like shadows and mysterious sounds start to creep into the minds of soldiers. Sanders told the Tim a story of some soldiers that heard things that weren’t possible to hear in Vietnam. “So after a couple days the guys start hearing this real soft, kind of whacked-out music. Weird echos and stuff. Like a radio or something, but it’s not a radio, it’s this strange gook music that comes right out of the rocks… All kinds of chimes and xylophones… I mean, this is the wilderness – no way, it can’t be real- but there it is, like the mountains are tuned into radio.” (O’Brien 73). When telling a story it was hard for the narrator to be 100% sure of certain details of Curt Lemon. The Tim was terrified to go into war, he wanted to run to Canada. He thought he was to good for the war , to smart he went to Harvard. The O’Brien left to go to this motel he stumbled upon where he had the chance to run to Canada and didn’t due to the fact that he didn’t want to let down his family and country. Tim was put in a position that many other were, and the majority were scared , but these men were just getting out of college , barely men their whole life ahead of them. It takes an unmeasurable amount of courage to give your life to fighting for your country. The book gives you a glimpse into Vietnam or what is was like to being drafted into a war in general. The book introduces you into typical things soldier carried with them in Vietnam, physically and emotionally. It sucks you into the war you hear some of the stories, you get a small feel for the atmosphere, and you get to read about the experience of getting drafted along with all of the emotions and insecurities that go along with it.

  2. Jack Walt

    1. In The Things They Carried, the author Tim O’Brien gives readers a first hand experience of the war in Vietnam. In the first story, he talks about the physical and mental things that the soldiers carried. I initially interpreted the title as physical war necessities like guns and ammo but he soon explained the mental side of things. I was very interested in the numerous good luck charms and reminders that the soldiers carried. For example, Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried love letters from his “girlfriend” Martha to remind him of what he has waiting for him when he gets home. Factors like this and good charms helped keep the morale of the soldiers up while they were fighting this war. When many of the soldiers did return home, they could not forget the horrible memories they witnessed in Vietnam. Many saw their dearest friends dying by the minute and the baggage of terrible memories was something the soldiers carried home with them.

    2. In the story How to Tell a True War Story, O’Brien tells about the writing of a war story. He says’ that truth is important in story telling but the truth is sometimes exaggerated in those of war. He goes on to explain that sometimes the more gruesome and unbearable parts of the story may be true as some of the small scene setting details may be false. It is interesting to read this from O’Brien because he started the story off by saying it was true. This concept is seen when comparing the numerous stories of the Vietnam war portrayed by soldiers and the way they interpreted may bend the truth.

    I thought the book was very interesting and deepened my understanding for the war in Vietnam. It put me in the shoes of a soldier fighting from that time and the hardships they had to overcome by dropping everything for their country. I liked how it was split into different stories because as the reader it felt like I was in a new battle or situation every chapter. I also liked reading about what the soldiers did when they weren’t fighting because that tends to go unmentioned in the history textbooks.

  3. Celia Crompton

    Prompt 1: Physical and emotional baggage are the plague of a typical soldier on the ground in Nam, like Tim and his comrades. Examples of their physical baggage include the pebble that Cross carried and the dope that Ted Lavender carried. These smaller, physical items all had deeper emotional ties, so really the weight of them was much heavier than the reader might initially think. In addition to these earthly things, the men deal with the emotional trauma, still “humping” it to this day. Most notably was the man who wrote the book. He still suffers from stress when he remembers his first time killing a man, which is retold in a heartbreaking manner in one chapter.
    Prompt 4: Shame and embarrassment play a pivotal role in motivating young men to leave for and fight in the war. Many young men were stuck in between 2 options when drafted, like Tim in the book. They either run away from not only the draft, but their families and countries, or stay and fight in a war they don’t necessarily believe in. Arguably one of Tim O’Brien’s biggest decisions was whether he should run away to Canada or stay and be a man. When it finally came time for him to make his decision, he was swayed by the people he thought were watching him from the banks of the river. Although these people were imaginary, the opinions of people he had known were what pushed him to leave for Vietnam. He especially didn’t want to disappoint his family and have the town look down on them as well. He knew he would be a shame if he ran away to Canada. Another embarrassment motivated decision was when Curt Lemon was seen being scared of the dentist in front of his fellow soldiers, so in order to feel tough and not embarrassed anymore, he complains of a fake toothache later that night and gets a tooth pulled just to prove he isn’t scared. These both show that many soldiers’ inspirations were less themselves and more what other people thought of them, like their peers and family.
    Assessment: I enjoyed reading this book a lot. I think that it’s a lot to chew on, and maybe if I had more time to just focus on this book instead of other classes as well, it’d be easier to swallow. Personally, I did not skip the chapter on the Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong because I was curious as to what would happen. I was continually entertained by the book in that way, even when parts were cringe-y and horrific. It was really supplementary in my understanding of the Vietnam War as well. It cleared up parts about the draft and gave me a firsthand account of the horrors of the war, which I don’t think are publicized enough these days. I didn’t really like the main character because he seemed whiny to me, but I definitely have never been put into such a situation as he has. Overall this book was exciting, depressing, and informative. I would give it a 9/10.

  4. Lexy S.

    3. The soldiers feel isolated due to their undesirable situation and opposing backgrounds. Nearly all of the soldiers disagree with the war; those who don’t hate it, despite believing it is warranted. Another reason for the disconnect is the sense of surreality and inability to cope with the fact that they may soon be dead. The soldiers attempt to deal with their own situations and not get attached to others; they want to avoid more grief.

    4. The soldiers make many of their decisions based on the effect that they will have on their appearance. Shame and embarrassment dictate their lives; they fear being considered a coward by their peers. The soldiers don’t let themselves express their fear of death because they struggle with masculinity and a sense of duty to their country. Tim O’Brien had no desire to go to the war but was forced by his value of his and his parent’s image in their town. O’Brien describes his hatred of the war and knowledge that it’s wrong but still goes, not wanting to embarrass his family. Tim and the other soldier’s prioritization of their shame is a theme which carries throughout the novel.

    The book effectively immersed the reader in the events of Vietnam. Readers who have never experienced war before can feel the environment of Vietnam. The author also shows his feelings realistically, describing his mix of shame, rage, knowledge of injustice, etc. Overall, the book is very well-written and paced. The story is character-driven, and the characters are complex. Many of them are not necessarily the fearless, faultless soldiers one would expect to read in a book about war. The Vietnam soldiers are described as all continuing for their own individual reasons, many of them related to shame.

  5. Zacharie Chentouf

    (Brief Assessment) The Things They Carried, written by Tim O’Brien, was an amazing read for me. I have read many stories about war before, especially this summer about World War II (All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr) or a veteran from World War I (The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Stedman), but these either showed the lives of the civilians living at the time such as in World War II, or the life of a soldier after the war, not during. Tim O’Brien does, in fact, write about the soldiers’ lives in the war, which gave me a new insight on war, a new perspective from the frontier, from the people fighting to protect the civilians I had been reading about. Furthermore, I had never read a book about the Vietnam War. I loved this book because it showed the different morals and ethics that soldiers had to face to first enter the war after being drafted, and also how their morals and ethics changed after and while fighting in the war. It was extremely interesting to see that there were still remnants of their ethics and morals before the war, however fragmented and small, or sometimes even heightened. There were multiple examples of this. We can see that some soldiers want to please their parents, such as Norman Bowker who wished his father didn’t care so much about him gaining any medals, who says so to Tim one night. Kiowa teaches a rain dance to Rat Kiley and Dave Jensen, showing that soldiers still want to have fun. Ted Lavender adopted a puppy, showing the morals of seeing the benefits of having a companion, and having them support you. Here, we also see the lack of morals because Azar straps a Claymore to it and blows it up. It is also extremely interesting to see that Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, twenty-four, burns the letters and photos of Martha, the girl he loves, because he feels as if he is not focused on the war enough, but we could also see the opposite side, which is that Martha gives him motivation to keep him fighting and to survive. It is fascinating to see that Cross believes that Martha and her pictures inhibit him more in Vietnam than motivating him, and here we see the remnants of love, but we also see the need for Tim to store them away. Another example is when Dave Jensen breaks Lee Strunk’s nose over a missing jackknife. Here, we see a greater sense of morals that we wouldn’t be able to see outside war. Since Dave was scared of Lee taking revenge and there were so many weapons including guns he could use, Dave broke his own nose with the barrel of a gun to make himself forgiven, which was more than what would have been done outside of the war, which could have been an apology. This created a mutual sense of trust that could only be achieved by these types of radical actions. This trust was stronger than most relationships could ever be, due to the conditions in which it was born. Sadly, Lee died from a rigged mortar round injury. Furthermore, when coming across a pagoda with a few monks west of the Batangan Peninsula, the soldiers worry about using the church as a base, as it is morally wrong to use such a peaceful and spiritual place for war reasons. This shows the way that the soldiers are still human. Another example that soldiers still felt human, specifically Tom, is when he kills a man using a grenade when he is coming out of the fog. At first, we see how morals and ethics are gone during the war, as he kills him without seeing him as the enemy, just as something needed to be made gone, but with the realization of the killing, Tom empathizes with the young man who could have been a brilliant scholar, and was not meant for the war, knowing he would die, as he was weak and fragile. Also, Henry Dobbins is extremely defensive of the girl that dances, whose family was found dead and burned, and will not let Azar make fun of her, out of respect for her and her family, reflecting the values he still had. For me, reading this book was also beneficial because it allowed me to see a different way for people to overcome their fears. For example, dentists creep Curt Lemon out, since he had had bad experiences with them in high school. Because of this, in the war, he fainted before the dentist even touched him when going to his tent. Instead of not going to see him, he forced the dentist to pull out a good tooth by telling him the pain was insurmountable, so that he would never be scared of dentists again. Even though he was in physical pain after this, his mental health was good as he was smiling at surmounting his fear. Out of the war, Curt probably would never have dealt with this fear, or maybe would have used his friends or parents as sources of courage and dependence, but in the war, he pulls through alone and independently, giving him a greater sense of achievement. In the war, we also see the soldiers having a sense of faith in something greater than themselves, in faith in something. This is perfectly and strangely represented by Henry Dobbins who wears his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck even though she breaks up with him. This is because the good memories of her, and the love he has for her creates the magic that inhabits the pantyhose, which will never go away. All these different mini sub-plots made this an extremely enjoyable read for me, as they all have different themes and morals.

    (2) In “How to Tell a True War Story”, which at often times can seem contradictory, the truth is not something concrete, but something that becomes distorted with the feelings of the moment. First, war stories that actually happened have no moral, and it is not possible to take anything good or proper human behavior away from it. If there is a moral, then the story is false, or the moral may have to have a really deep meaning. For example, after a friend, Curt Lemon, of Bob Kiley, nicknamed Rat, dies, he writes a letter to his sister explaining how they were like brothers, all the good times they had together, and all the moments they shared, such as when they went fishing with grenades, and then the letter gets heartfelt and serious, how Bob and his friends were like soul mates, and that Bob will look her up at the end of the war, and to this amazing letter, the sister never responds. After marching across a muddy river, and going into the mountains, the soldiers go into a separate path leading into the deep jungle, where Curt and Rat start fooling around immediately, playing catch with a set smoke grenade under deep canopy, and the first one to chicken out was a yellow mother. If no one did, smoke would cover them both, and they would do it again. Mitchell Sanders sat playing with his yo-yo, while Norman Bowker, Kiowa, and Dave Jensen were dozing off. What happened next is hard to tell truthfully because what Tim saw was distorted with feelings, and was not necessarily what happened, but it was the way he saw it, so is that considered the truth? It was to Tim. Tim heard a noise, which must have been the detonator of the booby-trapped 105, and Tim saw Curt Lemon go from the shade into bright sunlight, where his now brown face was shining. The sharp gray eyes, narrow, were emphasized, and it was majestic to Tim how the sunlight engulfed Curt into a tree that had moss, vines, and white blossoms. However, this was probably not sunlight, but the flash from the detonation, but both versions of the story are true, except that one was from Tim’s perspective. After this, the platoon found a baby VC water buffalo, and to let off some steam after it refuses a can of C rations, pork and beans, Rat shoots it up, even going to automatic, before dropping it in the closest village’s well when it is still alive. Also, when someone is dying or something horrible is happening, a person tends to look back and forth between the event, hesitating between covering their eyes or watching the event in full, which tends to mix around pictures of what actually happened. Many times, a person telling a war story will tell the crazy stuff they saw from their perspective truthfully, but might throw in normal things so that you believe the crazy things, so a true war story can never be completely believed. This is especially true when Mitchell Sanders told Tim a story. They are sitting in a foxhole near a muddy river north of Quang Ngai, with a pinkish sky over the river. Mitchell tells Tim about a six-man patrol that has to radio in any enemy movements in the mountains, and don’t talk. They are in the mountains up in the clouds where everything is wet and fog is everywhere, and they lie down in camouflage. After a few days, they hear music, a concert, but can’t radio that in. Another night they start hearing voices as if they were at a cocktail party, and another night they here chamber music with symphonies, violins, and cellos. Later, they even hear opera, a glee club, boys’ choir from Haiphong, a barbershop quartet, and chanting about Buddha. What they are actually hearing are the mountains, fog, trees, mongooses, and everything around them themselves talking politics, the monkeys religion… They freak out and call in air strikes, and gunships after reporting that there is a complete army. The mountains are made to burn with napalm, too. At dawn, things get quiet and there are no sounds, but the six men still hear it, and pack up and go back to base camp. The colonel wants answers after spending six trillion dollars on weapons, but the men just salute him and walk away. This finishes the story. When the platoon prepares to leave the next day, Sanders goes tell Tim he had to make a few things up in the story such as the glee club, the opera, and more. War stories can’t generalize, either. It is true that war is hell, but it isn’t all the time, as there are so moments of adventure, courage, discovery, and even fun, like Curt and Rat. War also matures people, but can also kill you. War can be beautiful, too, the movement of troops, so organized, the beautiful gunshots coming from others, and all this, your eyes take in, even though your brain hates all of it. A true war story will tell what the eyes see, which can be an ugly truth, and the eyes often times contradict the brain. Also, a near-death experience will give anyone a greater appreciation of life, such as a firefight. Mitchell Sanders was right, that war’s only truth is its ambiguity, its fog, the right and wrong being intertwined, as well as the beautiful and ugly. The morals, themes, or points of war stories can hit you many years later in the middle of the night, as it did for Tim about Dave Jensen singing “Lemon Tree” when picking up the dead parts of Curt Lemon. Finally, a true war story could have never happened, but a lie could have happened. An example of this would be there are four soldiers, and one grenade is thrown at them. A person jumps on the grenade, but it is a killer grenade, so it does not matter, and they all die. This is true, but it never happened because it was the right thing to do, an soldiers do the right thing so it is true, but it never happened. In conclusion, war stories are never directly about war. They are always about something else, whether it be love and a friend’s sister, or the ambiguity of all morals in the war, love and memory, sunlight, or sorrow. To get closer to the truth of a war story, which is really its message, you have to keep saying it, removing and adding pieces and bits here and there.

    (4) Shame or the idea of letting another person down motivates Tim and other soldiers in the stories by giving them a good reason to keep going, or to avoid the embarrassment of not even starting. For example, Tim just graduates college in June 1968, Macalester College, when he is drafted to fight in Vietnam at twenty-one, for a war in which he does not believe, with uncertain reasons. Some of these included whether Ho Chi Minh was a terrible Communist, or an amazing nationalist, what really happened with the USS Maddox, was it a civil war, and who was it started for, and for what, national liberation or just aggression. Tim does not believe blood should fall for unclear reasons, and he believes he is too good for this war. At dinner, his father asks him what he will do, and Tim just says wait. At this time, Tim is working in a meatpacking plant in his hometown of Worthington, Minnesota, and his job is to remove blood clots from the neck and the upper chest cavity using a water gun on an assembly line. The stink would not go away even after washing. Sometimes at night, Tim would take his father’s car, and think about his situation, having pity for himself and thinking about not wanting to die. Tim starts thinking about Canada in mid-July, but is also scared of being exiled from his family, friends, and hometown. However, if he does not go to Canada, he would risk his life in the war. Then one day on the assembly line, he feels a physical blow in his chest, as if something is leaking, and goes home early, packs a suitcase, showers, and writes a note to his parents saying he would call. He goes all the way up to the Canadian border, and stops a half-mile from it in a closed gas station where he sleeps overnight. Then the next morning, he drives along the Rainy River, the only thing separating him from his current life to another. He does not know what to do, whether he should go to Canada, which would take great courage to face the shame and embarrassment of deserting and seeming unpatriotic, and letting his parents, friends, family down, or whether he should be a coward and go to the war. This is an interesting viewpoint because many people think of going to the war as courageous, but from Tim’s perspective, it is cowardly because the idea of letting his family down and embarrassment drives him to go the war, not his desire to help his country, and he is not going there of his own accord. After driving around for a little while, Tim pulls into an old fishing resort called the Tip Top Lodge, and Elroy Berdahl, eighty-one years old takes him in for what will be six days. He stays with him, only the two of them, eating meals together, and Elroy taking him without comment. He gives him a key to his room, and also seems to understand that Tim is in a crisis at this time. During his time there, Tim helps the lodge get ready for winter, and also thinks about how border patrols and police officers with helicopters would be chasing him down across the border if he was to go to Canada, not being able to sleep. Elroy wants to give Tim money, and makes up an excuse by saying he should pay for what the meat-packaging factory would have given, after Tim tells him about it, but makes the wage higher too, to fifteen dollars, all this minus the price that Tim has to pay for staying at the lodge. Tim takes the money in an envelope, which says emergency fund in it, suggesting Elroy knows about his crisis. On the sixth day, Elroy takes Tim out to fish, and Tim cries, while Elroy pretends not to pay attention, because of his moral dilemma. He tries to commit suicide by telling himself to jump over the boat, but is not able to, and instead decides to submit and go to the war, because he is embarrassed not to. He is embarrassed not to kill for his country, and decides to leave the lodge. Before leaving, he gives the two hundred dollars given to him by Elroy back to him by setting them down on the kitchen counter. This shows a different view on the war, the view that it would be cowardly to go, but brave to face the shame that would come with deserting your duty. Here, we see that shame drives Tim on to go the war, the idea of embarrassing everyone he knows, and being an outsider to his hometown scares him too much. Shame as motivation is also seen after the death of Ted Lavender when he is returning to the group from peeing. Lee Strunk first goes down a tunnel after drawing the number seventeen since there were seventeen people left before Lavender’s death, and goes in headfirst with a flashlight after removing all this gear near the village of Than Khe. This is when Lavender leaves the group after popping a tranquilizer to pee. Then, Cross goes to the tunnel to check it out as Strunk is inside, but without willing to, thinks about Martha, her secrets, him kissing her, her loneliness, her being a virgin, his want for her to be a virgin and not be one at the same time, them on the Jersey shore under the sand, and loses his focus on Strunk. Strunk then comes out, and makes a moaning sound, which coincides with the bullet hitting Lavender’s face and breaking his teeth. Later that night, after leading his soldiers across the village of Than Khe, shooting chickens and dogs, Cross tries not to cry of shame, and digs a foxhole. He then cries, and is so ashamed of having had more love for Martha than his own men, burning Martha’s letters and two photographs. Realizing his mistake, his shame and the idea of letting Ted Lavender down now motivates Jimmy Cross, as he vows to comport himself as an officer, offer non negligence, impose strict discipline, keep the flanks securing, clean weapons, remove the intake of drugs, keep a proper pace, to no longer abandon equipment, and he would lead, not love, all this set in place because he lets down Ted Lavender. Another example of this is the way that Jimmy Cross does not give up and is motivated by his love for Martha. Even though he burns the photographs and letters of her because he believes it hinders his performance, his love for her does not die, even after the war, as he tells Tim.

  6. Lizzie Potocsky

    Assessment:

    Tim O’brien’s The Things They Carried made me get a real feel for what it is like to be a soldier inside a war. I have studied wars all my life in history, but I have never read something like this novel. While I will never know what war is truly like, the novel pulled me in and made it feel like I was standing in the shoes of the characters. I like how the book includes many different stories instead of one plot all throughout a novel.

    1.) In the first chapter of the novel, O’brien writes about the physical items that each soldier carries. However, as the stories go on, O’Brien gives the title a deeper meaning and exemplifies the emotional luggage that the soldiers also carry throughout the war and after. From reading, we learn that many soldiers brought a small item to comfort them. These items provide a feeling of protection in the devastating time of war. For example, Henry Dobbins carries around with him his girlfriend’s pantyhose. “The pantyhose, he said, had the properties of a good-luck charm…they kept him safe” (129). Lieutenant Cross carries around letters from a lover, Martha. The materials that the soldiers had to carry were heavy and excruciating, but the feelings of guilt, sadness, loss, and remorse weigh down on the soldiers way more. The pain that the soldiers felt from carrying the materials was temporary, however the emotional drainage they feel will not go away. It is excruciating. The things that they saw were things that no person should ever see. The soldiers had to kill people, see their friends die, see legs get blown off, and more unimaginable sights. In the beginning of the novel, Lieutenant Cross was a bit distracted in Martha’s letters than he lost a little focus. His friend, Ted Lavender had went to the bathroom, only later we find out that he died on his way back. Lieutenant Cross instantly blames himself. The guilt that he has will never go away, even if he is not actually at fault for the situation. The same goes for O’Brien, when he describes the first time he shot at someone. It is an awful moment; one that will haunt him until the day that he dies. War does awful things to a person and their view on the world. In The Things They Carry, while they physical items they bring with them are heavy, the emotional luggage is even heavier and brings an agonizing pain that is extremely hard to go away.

    3.) While you would think that war is always full of action and there are always people around and never anytime to sleep, Tim O’brien makes it clear to readers that war is in fact extremely lonely. You feel isolated from your friends and family. There is little contact with them, except through letters. While each man fighting is surrounded by other men in a similar situation as them (young and does not actually want to be fighting), many do not feel a connection to one another. I think that this is because they are often thinking about home, that it is almost impossible to really connect with someone. Second, it is scary to connect with someone that has a great possibility of dying. With all of their fears and longing for home, it must be hard to build relationships with others on the battlefield. I think that the draft is partly responsible for this, as the men are fighting a war that they do not even want to participate in. However, I do think that in any war, even if one voluntarily chooses to fight, the emotional baggage and longing for home does not vanish. War in general is a lonely experience. Each man never knows when he might lose a fellow soldier or even himself. If your best soldier buddy died in battle, you can’t stop fighting because of him. You still have to fight so that yourself makes it home, even if that is emotionally unbearable. That is why war is a lonely experience. While you are fighting for your country, you are more so fighting for yourself, just trying to get out alive.

  7. Ian Birley

    1. The things they carried. They carried their weapons, ammunition, food, foxhole digging devices (and various other tools). All of these were carried in their rucksacks that they would haul every day to do their day to day tasks. More weighted than the physical, though, was the emotional. Henry Dobbins, like in the prompt, wore his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck as a comforter. The main subject of the first chapter was Lieutenant Jimmy Cross’ complete infatuation with a girl, Martha, from back home. He vividly describes how much he loved her, and how much she would never love him. He pictures of her that he would look at every night. Looking back, he would constantly grieve at how much she blinded him. Throughout the chapter, he would constantly talk about before Ted Lavender’s death. When the story comes up about Lavender, we see Cross is very upset. It is ambiguous as to what exactly he is upset about. He, of course, was upset by his squad mate’s death, but it seemed he was more upset about Martha. He felt like it was his infatuation with her that led to his death, though to the reader it seemed unpreventable. That night, he burned the photos of her, mostly on principle.

    2. In the chapter “How to Tell a True War Story”, we see many stories that were supposedly absolutely true about Vietnam. They seem completely unrealistic and impossible, but it being told as if it were the truth makes it absolutely terrifying. The particular story on the music in the distance was thoroughly creepy. A group of soldiers lays low in a RADAR station to listen for suspicious movement. What they end up hearing one night is music in the distance, but these people are in the middle of the jungle, and there is no way they should be able to hear music. This happens multiple nights, and they never figured out what it was. Perhaps this was the war playing tricks on their minds. If anything, a story that is ambiguous to whether or not it is the truth is terrifying in its own right.

    This book was an interesting read; it provided a very personal light on the Vietnam War. It is told in a very relatable, human perspective. I haven’t read many books that are about the soldier’s experiences, rather than the political leaders. This definitely opened up my eyes and will likely read more books of that sort in the future.

  8. Zacharie Chentouf

    (Brief Assessment) The Things They Carried, written by Tim O’Brien, was an amazing read for me. I have read many stories about war before, especially this summer about World War II (All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr) or a veteran from World War I (The Light Between Oceans by M. L. Stedman), but these either showed the lives of the civilians living at the time such as in World War II, or the life of a soldier after the war, not during. Tim O’Brien does, in fact, write about the soldiers’ lives in the war, which gave me a new insight on war, a new perspective from the frontier, from the people fighting to protect the civilians I had been reading about. Furthermore, I had never read a book about the Vietnam War. I loved this book because it showed the different morals and ethics that soldiers had to face to first enter the war after being drafted, and also how their morals and ethics changed after and while fighting in the war. It was extremely interesting to see that there were still remnants of their ethics and morals before the war, however fragmented and small, or sometimes even heightened. There were multiple examples of this. We can see that some soldiers want to please their parents, such as Norman Bowker who wished his father didn’t care so much about him gaining any medals, who says so to Tim one night. Kiowa teaches a rain dance to Rat Kiley and Dave Jensen, showing that soldiers still want to have fun. Ted Lavender adopted a puppy, showing the morals of seeing the benefits of having a companion, and having them support you. Here, we also see the lack of morals because Azar straps a Claymore to it and blows it up. It is also extremely interesting to see that Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, twenty-four, burns the letters and photos of Martha, the girl he loves, because he feels as if he is not focused on the war enough, but we could also see the opposite side, which is that Martha gives him motivation to keep him fighting and to survive. It is fascinating to see that Cross believes that Martha and her pictures inhibit him more in Vietnam than motivating him, and here we see the remnants of love, but we also see the need for Tim to store them away. Another example is when Dave Jensen breaks Lee Strunk’s nose over a missing jackknife. Here, we see a greater sense of morals that we wouldn’t be able to see outside war. Since Dave was scared of Lee taking revenge and there were so many weapons including guns he could use, Dave broke his own nose with the barrel of a gun to make himself forgiven, which was more than what would have been done outside of the war, which could have been an apology. This created a mutual sense of trust that could only be achieved by these types of radical actions. This trust was stronger than most relationships could ever be, due to the conditions in which it was born. Sadly, Lee died from a rigged mortar round injury. Furthermore, when coming across a pagoda with a few monks west of the Batangan Peninsula, the soldiers worry about using the church as a base, as it is morally wrong to use such a peaceful and spiritual place for war reasons. This shows the way that the soldiers are still human. Another example that soldiers still felt human, specifically Tom, is when he kills a man using a grenade when he is coming out of the fog. At first, we see how morals and ethics are gone during the war, as he kills him without seeing him as the enemy, just as something needed to be made gone, but with the realization of the killing, Tom empathizes with the young man who could have been a brilliant scholar, and was not meant for the war, knowing he would die, as he was weak and fragile. Also, Henry Dobbins is extremely defensive of the girl that dances, whose family was found dead and burned, and will not Azar make fun of her, out of respect for her and her family, reflecting the values he still had. For me, reading this book was also beneficial because it allowed me to see a different way for people to overcome their fears. For example, dentists creep Curt Lemon out, since he had had bad experiences with them in high school. Because of this, in the war, he fainted before the dentist even touched him when going to his tent. Instead of not going to see him, he forced the dentist to pull out a good tooth by telling him the pain was insurmountable, so that he would never be scared of dentists again. Even though he was in physical pain after this, his mental health was good as he was smiling at surmounting his fear. Out of the war, Curt probably would never have dealt with this fear, or maybe would have used his friends or parents as sources of courage and dependence, but in the war, he pulls through alone and independently, giving him a greater sense of achievement. In the war, we also see the soldiers having a sense of faith in something greater than themselves, in faith in something. This is perfectly and strangely represented by Henry Dobbins who wears his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck even though she breaks up with him. This is because the good memories of her, and the love he has for her creates the magic that inhabits the pantyhose, which will never go away. All these different mini sub-plots made this an extremely enjoyable read for me, as they all have different themes and morals.

    (2) In “How to Tell a True War Story”, which at often times can seem contradictory, the truth is not something concrete, but something that becomes distorted with the feelings of the moment. First, war stories that actually happened have no moral, and it is not possible to take anything good or proper human behavior away from it. If there is a moral, then the story is false, or the moral may have to have a really deep meaning. For example, after a friend, Curt Lemon, of Bob Kiley, nicknamed Rat, dies, he writes a letter to his sister explaining how they were like brothers, all the good times they had together, and all the moments they shared, such as when they went fishing with grenades, and then the letter gets heartfelt and serious, how Bob and his friends were like soul mates, and that Bob will look her up at the end of the war, and to this amazing letter, the sister never responds. After marching across a muddy river, and going into the mountains, the soldiers go into a separate path leading into the deep jungle, where Curt and Rat start fooling around immediately, playing catch with a set smoke grenade under deep canopy, and the first one to chicken out was a yellow mother. If no one did, smoke would cover them both, and they would do it again. Mitchell Sanders sat playing with his yo-yo, while Norman Bowker, Kiowa, and Dave Jensen were dozing off. What happened next is hard to tell truthfully because what Tim saw was distorted with feelings, and was not necessarily what happened, but it was the way he saw it, so is that considered the truth? It was to Tim. Tim heard a noise, which must have been the detonator of the booby-trapped 105, and Tim saw Curt Lemon go from the shade into bright sunlight, where his now brown face was now shining. The sharp gray eyes, narrow, were emphasized, and it was majestic to Tim how the sunlight engulfed Curt into a tree that had moss, vines, and white blossoms. However, this was probably not sunlight, but the flash from the detonation, but both versions of the story are true, except that one was from Tim’s perspective. After this, the platoon found a baby VC water buffalo, and to let off some steam after it refuses a can of C rations, pork and beans, Rat shoots it up, even going to automatic, before dropping it in the closest village’s well when it is still alive. Also, when someone is dying or something horrible is happening, a person tends to look back and forth between the event, hesitating between covering their eyes or watching the event in full, which tends to mix around pictures of what actually happened. Many times, a person telling a war story will tell the crazy stuff they saw from their perspective truthfully, but might throw in normal things so that you believe the crazy things, so a true war story can never be completely believed. This is especially true when Mitchell Sanders told Tim a story. They are sitting in a foxhole near a muddy river north of Quang Ngai, with a pinkish sky over the river. Mitchell tells Tim about a six-man patrol that has to radio in any enemy movements in the mountains, and don’t talk. They are in the mountains up in the clouds where everything is wet and fog is everywhere, and they lie down in camouflage. After a few days, they hear music, a concert, but can’t radio that in. Another night they start hearing voices as if they were at a cocktail party, and another night they here chamber music with symphonies, violins, and cellos. Later, they even hear opera, a glee club, boys’ choir from Haiphong, a barbershop quartet, and chanting about Buddha. What they are actually hearing are the mountains, fog, trees, mongooses, and everything around them themselves talking politics, the monkeys religion… They freak out and call in air strikes, and gunships after reporting that there is a complete army. The mountains are made to burn with napalm, too. At dawn, things get quiet and there are no sounds, but the six men still hear it, and pack up and go back to base camp. The colonel wants answers after spending six trillion dollars on weapons, but the men just salute him and walk away. This finishes the story. When the platoon prepares to leave the next day, Sanders goes tell Tim he had to make a few things up in the story such as the glee club, the opera, and more. War stories can’t generalize, either. It is true that war is hell, but it isn’t all the time, as there are so moments of adventure, courage, discovery, and even fun, like Curt and Rat. War also matures people, but can also kill you. War can be beautiful, too, the movement of troops, so organized, the beautiful gunshots coming from others, and all this, your eyes take in, even though your brain hates all of it. A true war story will tell what the eyes see, which can be an ugly truth, and the eyes often times contradict the brain. Also, a near-death experience will give anyone a greater appreciation of life, such as a firefight. Mitchell Sanders was right, that war’s only truth is its ambiguity, its fog, the right and wrong being intertwined, as well as the beautiful and ugly. The morals, themes, or points of war stories can hit you many years later in the middle of the night, as it did for Tim about Dave Jensen singing “Lemon Tree” when picking up the dead parts of Curt Lemon. Finally, a true war story could have never happened, but a lie could have happened. An example of this would be there are four soldiers, and one grenade is thrown at them. A person jumps on the grenade, but it is a killer grenade, so it does not matter, and they all die. This is true, but it never happened because it was the right thing to do, an soldiers do the right thing so it is true, but it never happened. In conclusion, war stories are never directly about war. They are always about something else, whether it be love and a friend’s sister, or the ambiguity of all morals in the war, love and memory, sunlight, or sorrow. To get closer to the truth of a war story, which is really its message, you have to keep saying it, removing and adding pieces and bits here and there.

    (4) Shame or the idea of letting another person down motivates Tim and other soldiers in the stories by giving them a good reason to keep going, or to avoid the embarrassment of not even starting. For example, Tim just graduates college in June 1968, Macalester College, when he is drafted to fight in Vietnam at twenty-one, for a war in which he does not believe, with uncertain reasons. Some of these included whether Ho Chi Minh was a terrible Communist, or an amazing nationalist, what really happened with the USS Maddox, was it a civil war, and who was it started for, and for what, national liberation or just aggression. Tim does not believe blood should fall for unclear reasons, and he believes he is too good for this war. At dinner, his father asks him what he will do, and Tim just says wait. At this time, Tim is working in a meatpacking plant in his hometown of Worthington, Minnesota, and his job is to remove blood clots from the neck and the upper chest cavity using a water gun on an assembly line. The stink would not go away even after washing. Sometimes at night, Tim would take his father’s car, and think about his situation, having pity for himself and thinking about not wanting to die. Tim starts thinking about Canada in mid-July, but is also scared of being exiled from his family, friends, and hometown. However, if he does not go to Canada, he would risk his life in the war. Then one day on the assembly line, he feels a physical blow in his chest, as if something is leaking, and goes home early, packs a suitcase, showers, and writes a note to his parents saying he would call. He goes all the way up to the Canadian border, and stops a half-mile from it in a closed gas station where he sleeps overnight. Then the next morning, he drives along the Rainy River, the only thing separating him from his current life to another. He does not know what to do, whether he should go to Canada, which would take great courage to face the shame and embarrassment of deserting and seeming unpatriotic, and letting his parents, friends, family down, or whether he should be a coward and go to the war. This is an interesting viewpoint because many people think of going to the war as courageous, but from Tim’s perspective, it is cowardly because the idea of letting his family down and embarrassment drives him to go the war, not his desire to help his country, and he is not going there of his own accord. After driving around for a little while, Tim pulls into an old fishing resort called the Tip Top Lodge, and Elroy Berdahl, eighty-one years old takes him in for what will be six days. He stays with him, only the two of them, eating meals together, and Elroy taking him without comment. He gives him a key to his room, and also seems to understand that Tim is in a crisis at this time. During his time there, Tim helps the lodge get ready for winter, and also thinks about how border patrols and police officers with helicopters would be chasing him down across the border if he was to go to Canada, not being able to sleep. Elroy wants to give Tim money, and makes up an excuse by saying he should pay for what the meat-packaging factory would have given, after Tim tells him about it, but makes the wage higher too, to fifteen dollars, all this minus the price that Tim has to pay for staying at the lodge. Tim takes the money in an envelope, which says emergency fund in it, suggesting Elroy knows about his crisis. On the sixth day, Elroy takes Tim out to fish, and Tim cries, while Elroy pretends not to pay attention, because of his moral dilemma. He tries to commit suicide by telling himself to jump over the boat, but is not able to, and instead decides to submit and go to the war, because he is embarrassed not to. He is embarrassed not to kill for his country, and decides to leave the lodge. Before leaving, he gives the two hundred dollars given to him by Elroy back to him by setting them down on the kitchen counter. This shows a different view on the war, the view that it would be cowardly to go, but brave to face the shame that would come with deserting your duty. Here, we see that shame drives Tim on to go the war, the idea of embarrassing everyone he knows, and being an outsider to his hometown scares him too much. Shame as motivation is also seen after the death of Ted Lavender when he is returning to the group from peeing. Lee Strunk first goes down a tunnel after drawing the number seventeen since there were seventeen people left before Lavender’s death, and goes in headfirst with a flashlight after removing all this gear near the village of Than Khe. This is when Lavender leaves the group after popping a tranquilizer to pee. Then, Cross goes to the tunnel to check it out as Strunk is inside, but without willing to, thinks about Martha, her secrets, him kissing her, her loneliness, her being a virgin, his want for her to be a virgin and not be one at the same time, them on the Jersey shore under the sand, and loses his focus on Strunk. Strunk then comes out, and makes a moaning sound, which coincides with the bullet hitting Lavender’s face and breaking his teeth. Later that night, after leading his soldiers across the village of Than Khe, shooting chickens and dogs, Cross tries not to cry of shame, and digs a foxhole. He then cries, and is so ashamed of having had more love for Martha than his own men, burning Martha’s letters and two photographs. Realizing his mistake, his shame and the idea of letting Ted Lavender down now motivates Jimmy Cross, as he vows to comport himself as an officer, offer non negligence, impose strict discipline, keep the flanks securing, clean weapons, remove the intake of drugs, keep a proper pace, to no longer abandon equipment, and he would lead, not love, all this set in place because he lets down Ted Lavender. Another example of this is the way that Jimmy Cross does not give up and is motivated by his love for Martha. Even though he burns the photographs and letters of her because he believes it hinders his performance, his love for her does not die, even after the war, as he tells Tim.

  9. David Boarman *

    1.) In the novel The Things they carried, the soilders carried many things with them, as the title of the novel would suggest. I see no point in listing the things for the primary point of the things they carried was the significance behind them. In my eyes, the soilders carried things for three reasons: for luck, for comfort, or because they couldn’t let go if it. Firstly, the soilders carried things for luck. They believed that certain items would protect them in battle, like a rabbit’s foot. Next, the soilders carried things for comfort. Some of these include the pantyhose around the mentioned in the prompt. These were there to comfort, relax, and relieve tension on the soilders. Lastly, the soilders carried things that they couldn’t let go of. An exemple of this when Lt. Cross carried the pictures of the girl he couldn’t stop thinking about. His mind was always on her, and in his eyes it was the reason that one of his soilders died.
    4.) No one ever tries to let another person down. In school, I always tried extra hard in a school project because I didnt want to let the group down, or in track i ran extra hard in a relay because I didn’t want us to lose. This feeling of not wanting to let others down is amplified tenfold in war because when you let someone down in war, often times the other person will die. This is motivation to Tim and all of the soilders in his platoon because they don’t want to see anyone did, and they especially don’t want to have to live with anyone’s blood on THEIR hands.
    Overall, I think the novel was very good and it expanded my horizons. When I was a little kid my friends and I would always “play war”, but now I realize that war is nothing that should be played about. The story really captures the aspect of war in a new light and I thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

  10. Bryce Ulep

    1. The title of the things they carried was not only a physical meaning but it is also mental. In the book the soldiers carry their physical items, guns, ammo, helmets, uniforms, but they also carry many more not so physical items. The soldiers carry many emotional items in their minds including leaving their families or having a death in their family. These burdens are bad for the men but not always bad for the military over all. The men fight as though they have more to fight for, or something worth fighting for. They have a sense of revenge or venting their personal anger when fighting. Some soldiers also have good memories. The memories helped the soldiers get through the war. The good memories helped the soldiers stay strong mentally and stay persistent through the war.
    3. I feel like the soldiers cannot make friends easily in the war. The soldiers are quite preoccupied with training and preparing for fighting or just literal fighting to make friends with other people. The soldiers become pretty lonely considering they have no friends and have no motive to make friends. Another reason for soldiers not to make very good friends is that if they get too attached, they won’t be able to stay friends. During the war the other soldiers might die, but especially after the war everyone lives in different places and won’t maintain a friendship.
    Personally I enjoyed reading The Things They Carried. The novel was well paced and had an interesting plot. The author wrote the book in a sort of way that kept the book suspenseful. I couldn’t put the book down as I wanted to know what was happening next. The Things they carried was also a very good incite for what an actual soldier in The Vietnam war might actually feel like. Tim O’Brien gave good description to educate us on what the soldiers were doing and how they felt about it.

  11. Marshall Lockyer

    1. I only had to read the first couple of chapters to understand the title “The things they carried” doesn’t only include their gear, but their emotional burden as well. For example, Jimmy Cross carries her letters and a pebble in his mouth as a reminder and good luck charm about a girl named Martha who does not share his feelings. However, everyone carries things of their own that are totally different from each other’s. Tim O’Brian carries his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck; Ted Lavender carries marijuana to calm himself down, etc. During the Vietnam War, their emotional burdens got bigger and that stayed with them long after the war. For example, Jimmy Cross felt responsible for Lavender’s death even after the war ended because he was the group leader and constantly asked himself, if he could have done something different or if he put Lavender into a dangerous situation. All of the men have some experience that is very traumatizing and can cause PTSD and seriously change someone. The things they carried affected them mentally and physically.
    3. Tens of thousands of US troops were sent into Vietnam to fight the North and the VC, and the soldiers were still very lonely. And this makes perfect sense to me. These soldiers left everything to fight their war. They were away from their home, hometown, friends, parents and brothers and sisters. Not to mention there’s no guarantee that they’ll ever see them again. Part of the reason why home is so important is because that’s what they know, and if they’re anything like me then they hate change and miss their hometown more than anything else. There is no fighting at home, no worry of being ambushed, no worry of being shot while walking to their destination and nowhere near the environment. Not to mention, they’re not in Vietnam to make friends. Sure, they bond with fellow comrades, but those friendships will never be one of those where nothing can separate them. Maybe that’s a good thing though. In war they know that any day could be their last and losing a very close friend can make an already unbearable experience worse.

    Summary: This book really touched me. I knew all about the soldiers PTSD and all the obstacles they have to go through in war. I think because this is a fictitious story I was able to connect with Tim on a personal level. I truly felt bad when he discussed the death of his friends.

  12. Eric Ajluni

    1.
    The book makes it very apparent how badly war can emotionally scar a person heading into the war, and heading out. The name of the book, The Things They Carried, is symbolic because it shows two different meanings of what as actually being carried. While obviously every soldier would bring standard war tools such as weapons, protection, food and other essentials, every soldier brought sentimental objects as well. Examples are Cross’s letters, and Ted Lavender even brining dope along for the journey. Going into a war, these things were brought to represent the environment they were leaving behind in America, and to keep soldiers in touch with actual reality outside of war. However, after the war is where the more substantial “emotional baggage” would settle in. You hear all about war veterans who suffer from PTSD because of all the horrifying experiences that occurred at war. The book tells a story that more vividly expresses this experience. Lt. Cross is shown to be mentally sacred from his time killing other humans and fighting in the jungle. These emotions and thoughts can stick with someone forever.

    4.
    The idea of shame or letting another person down is one of the most compelling factors in the book towards the actions of the soldiers. This is most prominently shown with Tim. Tim does not believe in the war and does not want to fight in it, and even considers going to Canada. But the factor that motivates him to go to fight is shame and fear of embarrassment. Tim doesn’t want to be looked down upon by the people in his town. Tim also is scared not only for his own reputation, but for his family as well. He sees fleeing to Canada as a cowardly move, so this idea of failure and shame was not an option. This idea of shame and embarrassment of defeat is also seen in history itself, as president Lyndon B Johnson was recognized as never accepting failure for fear of embarrassment, and American public would eventually find out that America was stuck in the war to avoid humiliating defeat.

    The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien was a great read, and definitely one of the best assigned readings I have had recently. One of the best things about the book is how the author made it very personal as if the stories were right from his experiences. The stories told were compelling yet realistic at the same time, and kept me engaged. This book was a great pick to enhance the APUSH class for giving a more detailed picture on what life before, during, and after a war is really like.

  13. Ashley A

    1. Soldiers during the Vietnam War, enter first as people who have been drafted to fight for their country whether they wanted to or not. During the time of this war, the people being drafted were just boys, and they had to take on a war where their biggest fear was the possibility of dying. Because they have no choice but to take on the war, they needed things to comfort them , remind them of who they are, and get them through the rough times whether they were physical like the pebble the that Lt Cross carried, or a religion like Kiowa carried. I personally feel that at their age they couldn’t go into this war, knowing that there was the possibility that they would not come back without carrying something for help in the struggles of war. When the soldiers returned, they carried the pain of the fact that they have ended lives, caused pain to other families, and seen fellow soldiers killed and if they went in not wanting to do it or not understanding why, the pain would be increased. That type of pain and suffering takes lots of time to dull because something like that will never heal fully.
    3. I think that the soldiers don’t feel a strong connection to the war equally for both reasons that they don’t want to fight and that war is too much of a mentally trying thing to focus on creating friendship. Firstly, the soldiers like O’Brian didn’t understand the war enough to want to fight in it or just didn’t want to fight at all because of the fear of death. If you are constantly thinking about death or believe that you are fighting for a wrong cause, creating friends or connections is going to be difficult for you to do, even if you are surrounded by people. The soldiers could believe that they are all killing innocent lives and that can mentally block the happy part of people that create lasting connections. Secondly, war isn’t easy and not everyone can handle it. These soldiers killed people every day and have to live with the fact that they messed up the lives of children, wives, brothers, sisters, mothers and fathers. Also, being in multiple near death situations can take a toll on a person and be part of the creation of PTSD. Having these thoughts and going through these things are not easy, and if it were me, friends and connections wouldn’t be high on my list of things to think about during the war.
    I enjoyed this book very much and I felt that it made the struggles of the American soldier before and after Vietnam more realistic to me as a student that hasn’t lived through this era. Tim O’Brian did an excellent job of drawing the reader in sentimentally by sharing his war story, as well as the stories of others, that occurred before the war and lasted well after it.

  14. Henry Van Faussien

    1.) I think that tangible things were the only thing that got these soldiers through the mental struggle of a brutal war. Realistically these soldiers were fresh out of high school and college they were not mature. They had to make a rapid change of personality from being a kid with worries about academics and girls into thoughts like am I going to get killed today. The things they carried were a reminder to what they could come back to when they got back. It was no longer I hope I don’t die, but now it was I need to make it back so that I can see the people and things I love. Lt. Cross carried around photos of the only love he ever knew, Martha. Now it goes to show how drastic the change was because Martha and Cross did not have that romantic of a relationship but when he was pulled out to the war it was the only thing that he loved so he treasured it.

    2.) Loneliness was a necessity in the war. Vietnam was bloody. The soldiers would be making a mistake if they wanted to make a connection with their comrades. With the isolation that came with the war it would have been easy to connect with someone. The level of contact, I mean you see your platoon 24/7, and the common struggles and crisis you find yourselves in creates a situation where you have the same ideas. Why would this be dumb? The military casualties were very high everyday, upwards of 200 soldiers died everyday. Let alone being away from home that long is emotional enough now to add the death of a friend it would be too much.

    This book offers an interesting perspective to the lives of Vietnam War soldiers. I enjoyed reading it because I am a historical war nut. But you do not have to be like me to enjoy this emotionally gripping story.

  15. Tania Miller

    The things that the soldiers carried in battle were not just physical things but mental / emotional as well.  Henry Dobbins wore his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck as a comforter.  But after the war is over and done with, the soldiers, like Lt. Cross, carry guilt and pain around with them.

    The soldiers suffered so much during the war. They left their lives for a war the majority of them didn’t want to fight. Especially Tim, he didn’t support the war yet he was forced to fight. The danger and threat of death constantly weighs on the men. When will their last meal be? Will they live to see tomorrow? Henry Dobbins wore his girlfriends pantyhose because it helped ease the pain of war. Lt. Cross continued to think about Martha, and looked forward to seeing her. Everyone copes with pain differently, and this is shown in the book. Once the war ended the men had to re custom themselves to normal life. Going from the jungle to a suburban neighborhood isn’t easy. These men constantly remember the death and suffering. That doesn’t just go away. The majority never go back to normal, they just learn how to handle the pain.

    3. The novel also captures loneliness and isolation experienced by the American soldiers while in the Vietnamese jungle.  Though the soldiers are surrounded by their comrades in arms, many don’t feel a connection to each other.  Could this be because they’ve been drafted into a war they don’t want to fight?  Or that war is the most loneliest experience — do or die on the battlefield?

    The soldiers felt alone because they were fighting a war they didn’t want to be a part of. Some men were for it, and some were against. This caused arguments and hostilities towards each other. So while they connected because of the war, their views were different. Also, Americans saw the soldiers as baby killers. These men were fighting to protect the Vietnamese and were given hostile remarks. They were under appreciated and under valued. Knowing that people hate you doesn’t make you want to work hard. Also, being in war, you have to wake up every day and know that it could be your last. Its hard to be optimistic and friendly when you could easily die.

    I thought the book was amazing. I never thought that a book about war would interest me. I understood everything the author said and even could relate to some points he made. A lot of war books are based on statistics, this book was personal and well detailed. He didn’t write the book in the mindset of a soldier, he wrote it in the mind set of a normal kid.

  16. Danielle Lutz

    1- After reading only a small portion of, The Things They Carried, it is quickly revealed that not only is the book about the things they carried physically in their backpacks for the war, but the things they carried mentally. The memories & thoughts of war were permanently drilled into their brains. The meaning of the title was much deeper than expected. All the men carried a small item that they carried through the war with them. Henry Dobbins carried his girlfriend’s pantyhose, Ted Lavender carried marijuana to calm him down, Kiowa carried a bible his father gave him, and Lieutenant Cross carried letters and a pebble given to him by Martha, a girl who he loves from his college back in New Jersey. Not only did their backpacks have pounds of gear in them that weighed them down, but their emotional backpacks weighed them down even more. Throughout the novel, their emotional backpacks become heavier and heavier. Watching a man die in front of your eyes, whether it be someone you know or not, can be an extremely traumatizing experience for anyone. These traumatizing experiences never go away. When the war ends & people head back to civilization, these things stay with a man forever.

    3- The way Tim O’Brien portrays the loneliness of the soldiers made me feel what they were feeling. I believe that the reason for their being no connection between the soldiers is due to their traveling minds. They are so focused on everything going on around them, if they’ll be the next to die, or if their next step will be on a landmine, there is no way connecting with other soldiers is a thought that would even cross their minds. Some might think, all the soldiers are going through the same fears of death, missing home, & the intense pressure from their country, why wouldn’t they want to talk to each other? If one of your friends died right in front of your eyes it would hurt so much more than watching a man you don’t know. I also see that being drafted has something to do with loneliness as well. When you are sent somewhere you don’t want to be, surrounded by other people who don’t want to be there, & you’re all scared to die, it sounds like everybody included in the experience would feel depressed. Going out into a do or die battle everyday can feel overwhelming, sad, & make you feel there is nothing to live for but the thought that maybe one day it will end & you can go back & forget about everything, but the memories of war will follow them back & this loneliness will never go away.

    The Things They Carried was a very interesting novel. We spend lots of time in class learning about the war from the perspective of the government and the people back at home, but we never get the perspective of the soldiers living the battles. It was really nice to hear that important time in history from a perspective of someone who lived it. I enjoyed this book and thought it was one of the more interesting books we have read in school.

  17. Rania Abbasi

    1. During the Vietnam War, because so many soldiers felt they weren’t prepared to go into war, they had to take something with them and carry it; it gave them a sense of identity. For example, Jimmy carried the letters from Martha. Things like this gave the soldiers pragmatism; and by this I mean being IN the war was much different than being outside the war, anxiously waiting the results. They had to have something with them that would take them away from the horrors of war and remind them of their lives at home. It’s interesting because during the war, men had to not only carry the burden of the soldiers lost, but they literally had to CARRY THE SOLIDERS on their backs—if they were wounded or dead. Now after they left Vietnam, they were forced to carry the same burden on their backs and feel the guilt of all the lives lost and all the tragedies seen—first-hand.
    3. Vietnam in many ways made the soldiers feel as though they were fighting to serve their country, and then get out. I truly believe that the war in itself is lonely and that one was quite isolated from anything back home (with the exception of the things they carried with them). In the depths of the jungle, American soldiers were 1. Not at home 2. Fighting a war they didn’t want to be in, in the first place. Many believed that they didn’t deserve to be in the war, like we see some of the characters believing. They felt as though they were “too good” for the war in the sense that they didn’t need the burden and the horrors of war on their innocent backs. This feeling going into the war made combat even more lonely because the felt like no one actually cared about them—in a sense.
    The Things They Carried is a book I’ll never really forget reading. I’ve heard so much about Vietnam and what went on POLITICALLY, but you never hear the stories of the actual soldiers and how each and every day affected them mentally, emotionally, and physically. I would recommend this to anyone that has an interest in learning more, or someone that is simply just ignorant to the truths and horrors of war.

  18. Lindsay Martin

    1. War causes all the soldiers to become overwhelmed with baggage. Whether it was carrying around pantyhose and all the memories of the people they loved, or carrying around the memories of the atrocities of war, soldiers were constantly carrying something. All the soldiers had some sort of memento that they could use to comfort themselves; whether it was pantyhose like Henry Dobbins, letters and a pebble like Lieutenant Cross, or even dope like Ted Lavender. In addition to the memories and mementos, the soldiers also had to wear an enormous weight in gear. The gear comforted some, but for others it was just weighing them down. But still, the gear didn’t even compare to the weight of the emotions felt. Tim O’Brien must live with the memory of when he killed someone, and he describes it in detail. He elucidates all the feelings of terror, but it will never fully be clear to us. They experienced traumatizing pain, they were forced to watch their comrades die right next to them. So even though they can discard their gear, they can’t ever discard the memories, and that’s a thing that they’ll always have to carry.

    2.In the story “How to Tell a True War Story”, the fact that there are no facts is prominent. In war, it can be hard to tell what’s genuine and what’s fake. It can be hard to differentiate- as you can never be sure if your mind is playing tricks on you. But you can always tell the story is a lie if it leaves you feeling triumphant or hopeful- because that is never the case in war. There can be two people in the exact same situation, but they can interpret what happened completely differently. No war story can be told with complete accuracy; stories can be altered to help soldiers cope. Some made up stories are easier to believe than the truth.

    The Things They Carried was an excellent novel. My favorite part was that it was written in first-person, so you felt as though you were experiencing everything. The book was honest and uncensored; and filled with detail. It helps readers understand what soldiers went through during the war, and was a page-turner.

  19. Khalil D

    The soldiers in The Things They Carried carried not only physical weight, but heavy mental weight as well. I believe if you were to ask them which was heavier they would tell you the mental weight. The soldiers had to carry the weight of killing other human beings, probably the hardest thing a person could ever do. As well as carrying the weight of killing people, soldiers also have to deal with some of their closest friends being killed, but seeing as they have no way to get away from it all the have to carry all that pain with them. Although the war is tough on the soldier’s minds, they still try to find ways to comfort themselves. In the book some soldiers had pictures of their family, others kept snacks in them and a one Guy even brought his girlfriend’s pantyhose with him to war. The heaviest things their carrying aren’t their weapons or ammunition, it’s the thought and harsh effects of the brutal war.

    Also to tell a true war story, according to the narrator, was interesting to me. He said to tell a true war story the truth must sound so much like a lie that you have to actually throw in a couple lies to make it sound true. I think he came to this conclusion when he realized that the events and scenarios these soldiers are put in sound unbelievably to the average person. The idea of someone having to bomb a soldier running past and then having to stare into his mutilated face sounds pretty bizarre and awful, so even though it happened people will deny it because that don’t want to believe it.
    Khalil D

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

*