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The opening line of this novel includes the word carried. O'Brien digs right in and begins to list all the things the young men carried with them in Vietnam; figuratively and literally. The repetition of the word carry is powerful and instructive. We all walk around with our personal burdens, our own histories, our generations history, and our own version of the larger culture into which we were born.
Note: For unsuspecting readers it is sometimes hard to remember this is a novel because Tim O'Brien names the narrator Tim O'Brien. I believe he does this intentionally to blur the line between fiction and memoir (non-fiction) in an attempt to get nearer the truth.
_________________ " How we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used." - Wendell Berry, What Are People For?
“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” -Thich Nhat Hahn
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O'Brien has certainly blurred the line between fiction and memoir. I'm glad you pointed this out because I have been struggling with this fact all along as I move from one war story to the next. It sure reads like a memoir.
Maybe we can uncover a little about the author to see how he came up with the ideas for some of these stories. Is there real truth to some of these or is he simply using creative writing to teach us about the Vietnamese war?
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If someone finds the answer to this question before me please post it here. But what does O'Brien mean when he dedicates this book to the men of Alpha Company? Aren't those men fictitious? Is he trying to tell us that those soldiers became very real to him over the course of writing these stories or were they real and the stories are about them?
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Tim O'Brien really was in the Vietnam War and some of the stories are true or fictionalized version of real things that happened to him. Later today I will find more information about O'Brien with citations (if I can).
_________________ " How we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used." - Wendell Berry, What Are People For?
“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” -Thich Nhat Hahn
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The book is often used as an example of a technique for preparing to write a novel. Aside from the previously noted insights in this thread, the "lists" are pretty standard fare for writing students as they build their characters. An instructor might ask a student to take one character and make five different lists; 1) what is in their medicine cabinet 2) what is in thr trunk of their car 3) what is in the box under their bed and so on to create in the writer's mind some sense of what this person collects, hides, uses or whatever. I read the book before having it assigned for this purpose and after the second time through I began to really appreciate the use of lists. As you read the book, notice the difference in the things each soldier carries and see if it says anything about how they fit into the story.
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The most important thing carried by each of the soldier is the psychological and emotional burden that comes with fighting in a war. O'Brien does an excellent job by seemingly just tossing these issues on the list with everything else that is standard issue for the soldier, he shows that no one walks away from war unscathed.
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Jeremy wrote:
O'Brien does an excellent job by seemingly just tossing these issues (psychological and emotional) on the list with everything else that is standard issue for the soldier, he shows that no one walks away from war unscathed.
I inserted the parentheses to clarify Jeremy's meaning, since I had not included his previous sentence in the above quote. After all that, I should have just quoted the whole thing. Jeremy's quote hits on one of the things I like best about O'Brien's book. The idea that what we carry literally and figuratively reflects who we are and what our life situation is. It is very powerful. O'Brien lists and lists and drives the point home hard; which highlights the absurdity of what the US soldiers faced in Vietnam. I really like the use of repetition through out the book. It could get to be too much, but he changes how he uses it just in time, so as not to spoil the effect or the narrative.
_________________ " How we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used." - Wendell Berry, What Are People For?
“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” -Thich Nhat Hahn
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I copied the following from Wikipedia:
Quote:
One attribute in O'Brien's work is the blur between fiction and reality; labeled "metafiction," his work contains actual details of the situations he experienced; while that is not unusual, his conscious, explicit, and metafictional approach to the distinction between fiction and fact is extraordinary: In the chapter "Good Form" in The Things They Carried, O'Brien casts a distinction between "story-truth" (the truth of fiction) and "happening-truth" (the truth of fact or occurrence), writing that "story-truth is sometimes truer than happening-truth." Certain sets of stories in The Things They Carried seem to contradict each other, and certain stories are designed to "undo" the suspension of disbelief created in previous stories; for example, "Speaking of Courage" is followed by "Notes," which explains in what ways "Speaking of Courage" is fictive.
I really like this explanation of the mixing of truth and fiction in a novel. The bold is of course mine. O'Brien uses metafiction masterfully. He opens the door on a philosophical discussion that is activity being debated in History departments everywhere. Who's version of history gets recorded? Who gets to do the recording? What exactly is the truth? Who's version of what happened are we going to record as history? And the biggest question of all, can any one person actually tell the factual "truth"? And his question: Are the facts the only, the whole truth? In later chapters O'Brien illustrates the problem of truth telling beautifully.
_________________ " How we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used." - Wendell Berry, What Are People For?
“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” -Thich Nhat Hahn
Last edited by Saffron on Fri Nov 07, 2008 10:30 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Aletheia
I know I have posted on the Greek concept of truth before, but it seem very relevant to the discussion of O'Brien's novel.
Aletheia (ἀλήθεια) is the Greek word for "truth", and like the English word implies sincerity as well as factuality or reality. The literal meaning of the word ἀ
_________________ " How we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used." - Wendell Berry, What Are People For?
“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” -Thich Nhat Hahn
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1st Chapter
Hello
Picked up The Things They Carried yesterday from the library and read the first chapter this morning.
I enjoyed it. Starting to get a feel for Lieutenant Jimmy Cross. What I am grateful for is that he got rid of what he was carrying. The pictures and the letters from Martha. He has too much to carry as it is, and to me that was an extra burden. He was creating illusions in his head and it was affecting his men as well as himself in a negative way. I think by unloading like he did in that foxhole he can focus better on his men.
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I finally got my copy of this book in the mail and started it this morning. I am very impressed with the writing style of this book and the talent O'Brien has by using these repetitive phrases and lists without it getting tedious or boring. Even his use of many short, simple sentences almost seems poetic.
He effortlessly weaves the emotions and stories into the lists and I did start to wonder if the story was partially biographical.
Saffron, I was very interested in the Greek concept of truth. I think the word truth is very misused by our society, or very misunderstood.
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Saffron said ..
"I really like this explanation of the mixing of truth and fiction in a novel. The bold is of course mine. O'Brien uses metafiction masterfully. He opens the door on a philosophical discussion that is activity being debated in History departments everywhere. Who's version of history gets recorded? Who gets to do the recording? What exactly is the truth? Who's version of what happened are we going to record as history? And the biggest question of all, can any one person actually tell the factual "truth"? And his question: Are the facts the only, the whole truth? In later chapters O'Brien illustrates the problem of truth telling beautifully."
I started Things They Carried last night and the first thing I noticed was this weaving of truth and fiction. Reminded me of another book I read recently, Colony of Unrequited Dreams which is posted here under the Additional Fiction section, and is similar in his respect.
Thinking back to the Vietnam war, one of the public themes of that conflict was truth versus fiction, disclosure versus cover up. One of the most graphic examples of this element of the Vietnam war was the deliberate manipulation of the 'truth' by government and media, "Manufacturing Consent" as it were.
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Re: 1st Chapter
Damifino wrote:
Hello
Picked up The Things They Carried yesterday from the library and read the first chapter this morning.
I enjoyed it. Starting to get a feel for Lieutenant Jimmy Cross. What I am grateful for is that he got rid of what he was carrying. The pictures and the letters from Martha. He has too much to carry as it is, and to me that was an extra burden. He was creating illusions in his head and it was affecting his men as well as himself in a negative way. I think by unloading like he did in that foxhole he can focus better on his men.
Sound insensitive? I don't think so.
Barb
I don't think you sound insensitive. I remember feeling some relief when Jimmy burned Martha's letters; but what is he really burning? Is Jimmy Cross culpable in any way for Ted Lavender's death?
_________________ " How we eat determines, to a considerable extent, how the world is used." - Wendell Berry, What Are People For?
“People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” -Thich Nhat Hahn
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Quote:
I remember feeling some relief when Jimmy burned Martha's letters; but what is he really burning? Is Jimmy Cross culpable in any way for Ted Lavender's death?
In his mind he is because he realizes that he has not really been 'there' for his men, his mind has elsewhere, daydreaming about Martha and therefore not doing his job the way he should be. Burning the pictures was symbolic for him as a way of commiting himself now to what he should be concentrating on.
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