Summary Of The Article 'The Grunts' By David Woods

Among the large group of American men to be drafted one of them was Tim O’Brien the author of the short story “The Things They Carried” 3. Aside from the exponential amount of men sent off to war, the Vietnam war already had a bad stigma. There was little public support due to the feeling of fighting and unwinnable war and the amount of men who were dying. In his story, O’Brien portrays this sense

O’Brien makes it understable to the readers that Bowker died in Vietnam and has no chance of recovering, he can’t seem to find meaning of life after the war. O’Brien’s main purpose of writing “Speaking of courage” was mainly to try and explain what soldiers had to deal with once they returned home from war, and not only how to deal with being disconnected from society, but also from their loved ones. After returning from

O’Brien The novel/autobiography, If I Die in a Combat Zone (1973), recounts author Tim O’Brien’s experiences with life, love, and personal dissention during possibly one of the most horrific military conflicts in history: the Vietnam War. In If I Die in a Combat Zone, Tim O’Brien gives a terrifying first-person perspective of his disdain and opposition toward the Vietnam War through his recollection of his internal struggle of living life in mid war Vietnam, the violence and loss of humanity that soldiers, and the life-altering, irreversible damage that the author/narrator endured during the Vietnam War. Throughout his involvement/participation in the Vietnam war, O’Brien was having a hard time coping with the way he felt about why the war was even happening to

Every day of our lives we are faced with the opportunity to believe and tell many tales, whether true or false, and exaggerations of daily events. Life is almost like a game of cards, we’re all given cards and it’s up to us to decide what, when and how we’re going to play them. Tim O'Brien uses the theme of storytelling in his book, The Things They Carried, to teach lessons from the war, and allow us to understand the baggage that he along with his fellow men carried. When storytelling the main idea is to connect people to the stories being told and the past to the future.

In the novel, the protagonist, Tim O'Brien, catalogs a variety of experiences his fellow soldiers and himself endured during their time in Vietnam. In war, soldiers become brothers and their lives become intertwined; talking through their lives before war while experiencing the same disasters of war every day. O'Brien writes, "they carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die" (1141), in which this phrase represents their time together as it might be their last. In O'Brien's Vietnam novel

A man who served will go ballistic just hearing the word "war." The sounds of firearms, grenade blasts, and the cries of fallen colleagues can send shivers down their spines when they relive their time spent behind enemy lines. War has a significant impact on a veteran's way of life after serving in the military, in addition to flashbacks. The horrific recollections of a soldier's time spent fighting for his country crush the human spirit on a daily basis. The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien places a strong emphasis on these topics.

Guilt. The Vietnam War had long-lasting impacts and effects on soldiers that carried on even after they fought in Vietnam. The memories of the war stick with them everyday, like a dark shadow following them everywhere as they move. This is shown in The Things They Carried with a character named Norman Bowker in the chapter of “Speaking of Courage”, who fought in the war and suffered from lots of guilt and trauma post-war. He exemplifies the guilt soldiers carried even until after the war because when his friend Kiowa sunk in mud, he felt like he could’ve done more in order to help his friend, such as trying to get his friend out and ignoring the smell that caused him to refuse to help.

Throughout the book, O’Brien tells many different stories about himself and his buddies during the war. He says true war stories have a certain fell to them. According to O’Brien, true war stories don’t generalize and will

Veterans carry guilt and regret from war, which illustrates the PTSD they develop from witnessing traumatic deaths that they feel responsible for. In the book, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, the soldiers in active war in Vietnam experience life changing events that leave them with emotional baggage that they have to carry with them throughout the war and after. In the chapter “Ambush” O’Brien speaks of the first man that he killed, and the guilt and regret that he carries from it. He said, “Even now I haven’t finished sorting it out. Sometimes I forgive myself, other times I don’t.

War can leave soldiers with life lasting consequences that steals you of your youth,innocence, purpose and mental health. These different emotional trauma that soldiers face can cause scars and permanent affect on the soldiers who served in the war. According to ptsd.va.gov 7 out of 100 veterans face ptsd or other mental issue after leaving war an only 30% of soldiers do not. In The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien the Vietnam War had stolen the brightness of American soldiers futures and lead them to have a negative impact mentally that eventually scared them for life. A few things vietnam war had stolen from Jimmy an his platoon would be resposiblity an accountability of it soldiers.

They should not be uplifting, enlightening, or teach people anything aside from the fact that war is absolute hell. “If a story seems moral, do not believe it. If at the end of a war story you feel uplifted, or if you feel that some small bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie” (O’Brien 1). True war stories are explicit, inhumane, and not bound by laws or social norms. If they don’t show the ugly, horrendous side of humanity then the story is not an actual war story.

Tim O'Brien claims the people “ did now know shit about shit, and did not care to know” (O’Brien 27). Returning from war O’Brien can now comment that nobody knows what he went through, how he went against his morals to now feeling forgotten in the present day. Tim O’Brien’s fear of being ashamed of the people he surrounded himself with is now taking place. All the Life changing commitments O’brien made to go to war, are the embarrassment and sorrow he still carries with

The soldiers in the Vietnam War are portrayed as losing themselves in the chaos and trauma of combat. Through the stories of the soldiers and their experiences, O’Brien explores the ways in which war strips away one's sense of identity and humanity. The author himself is depicted as losing himself in the war. O'Brien served in the Vietnam War, and his experiences inspired much of the book. Through the character of Tim O'Brien, the author explores the ways in which war can strip away one's sense of self and purpose.

The True Weight of War “The Things They Carried,” by Tim O’Brien, brings to light the psychological impact of what soldiers go through during times of war. We learn that the effects of traumatic events weigh heavier on the minds of men than all of the provisions and equipment they shouldered. Wartime truly tests the human body and and mind, to the point where some men return home completely destroyed. Some soldiers have been driven to the point of mentally altering reality in order to survive day to day. An indefinite number of men became numb to the deaths of their comrades, and yet secretly desired to die and bring a conclusion to their misery.

This sentence fragment emphasizes O’Brien’s propensity for making up details or changing the story entirely to convey his point. Another prime example would be the chapter entitled “Field Trip” in which O’Brien tells of a trip to the presumed site of Kiowa’s death with his daughter, Kathleen. As previously mentioned, there is no real Kathleen. Her inclusion highlights the divide between veteran and civilian in a way mere statement could not. In contrast to the creation of a fictitious daughter, O’Brien’s original changes to Norman Bowker’s story result in a loss of “metaphoric unity” and the “terrible killing power” of Bowker's experience in Vietnam (153).