Order from us for quality, customized work in due time of your choice.
In The Things They Carried, Tim OBrien underlines the devastating effects of war and the lasting damage of death that a soldier may witness or experience. OBrien employs a fragmentary and metafictional form of storytelling to highlight the theme of death and morality and explore the different perceptions of the actions of the war. OBrien informs us that war isnt always about the glory or the death of the soldiers, but instead, it is about beauty and friendship. A soldier’s experience during the war can never be forgotten. As for OBrien, he employs the concept of storytelling to help wash out the distressing images of war and subvert them into a rewarding memory. In Spin, OBrien states that he is forty-three years old now and is continuing to write war stories about the soldiers and his friends. He remembers the moments of Curt Lemons death and the time when Lavender had taken tranquilizers. As OBrien sits and remembers, he realizes that the bad stuff never stops happening and that its constantly replaying itself over and over , suggesting that sometimes memories of death can be so painful that they are impossible to forget. A part of OBrien thinks that he should stop writing about war and even looks at his daughter’s guiltless suggestion that he should stop writing about war stories as a motive to forget the gruesome past and move on. But OBrien attempts to bring the lives of the soldiers back, as his memories even have an entity of their own, and the soldiers who battled beside him who died, still exist in their way through memory and storytelling. In How To Tell a True War Story, after Curt Lemon’s death, the Alpha Company found a baby buffalo in the woods.
Drowning in his sorrow and guilt, Rat Kiley picked up a gun and shot it. He shot it at its ear then shot it at its knees and continued to shoot it, but only in places where the wounds wouldnt be fatal . OBrien tries to justify the story by stating that he had just lost his best friend and tortured the buffalo as a way of coping. Back home, OBrien would tell this story to old women and they could cry listening to it, but OBrien says that they didnt understand the meaning. War wasnt only about the gore and death, but instead, it was about the beauty of it and the friendships that were created. There is a right and wrong way to tell a story and OBrien even states that if a story is moral, then dont believe it. But what hes asking from the reader is for a sense of tenderness and nostalgia, because not only is there a right and wrong way to write stories, but there is also a right and wrong way to listen to them. In The Man I Killed, OBrien stands in front of a young man that he had just killed in My Khe. He continually repeats the same details about the man.
He states that one eye is a star-shaped hole and has arched eyebrows like a woman OBrien makes up a whole backstory of the life of the soldier to dilute his guilt for killing the man. The structure of the story employs a confession form, where OBrien forces himself to look at the dead body as a way of punishment and writes a story about him as a continuum. The story concludes with a one-sided conversation between Kiowa and OBrien. Kiowa tries to talk to OBrien but he remains silent. The discussion paints the restrictions of friendship and that no amount of companionship can make up for the reality of death, and the moral consequence of OBriens deed. As a result, OBrien utilizes the theme of death and morality to further explore the importance of remembering and overcoming one’s guilt within the war. He highlights aspects of truth in storytelling and ultimately concludes that it is not how you tell a story, but rather how it is perceived by the reader. He underlines that death can never leave a soldier’s mind, but you can choose whether to remember the gore and darkness of it or the bravery and friendship.
Order from us for quality, customized work in due time of your choice.