Wednesday, February 27, 2008
The Things They Carried: The Real Deal.
After reading the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien, I can't help but believe that it's the real deal. Every aspect of the novel seems to have an effect on me, I am not the biggest reading fan ever but while reading this story I feel as if I was reading O'Brien's personal journal. First of all, the language in which he wrote was so natural, inviting to an extent. I felt as if I was one of the fellers slugging around in the slumps. Even the way he implemented the use of profanity made his novel richer and more appealing to me as a reader. The way he described the soldiers physical and emotional burdens made me believe that this book was a true account of what these soldiers encountered during the Vietnam war. The way Henry Dobbins clutched on to his girlfriend's pantyhose, and Kiowa carried around his grandfather's hatchet, in contrast to soldiers that go to war today also tag along personal items. Maybe I'm reading too deep into it but in the chapter entitled Spin when the little boy asked for the chocolate bar, maybe it's coincidental but my uncle went to Kuwait recently, he's in the army and when he came back he told me how the children would be poorly dressed and that he also gave these kids chocolates and candies. O'Brien also showed us the effects the war had on the soldiers, for example in the chapter entitled Love Jimmy Cross states that he will never forgive himself for Lavender's death, and in the chapter Speaking of Courage Norman Bowker, wanders around aimlessly writing a 17 page letter to O'Brien telling him how he never felt right after the war, eventually hanging himself. In connection to present time, I have seen the psychological burdens many soidiers have after the war. Just last Saturday, I was on my way home from work on the E train, and there was this guy who sat opposite me, and he kept on mumbling and swaying back and forth. Another guy asked him what's his deal, and what did he say, he said, " I got damaged in the war." These are just a few reasons why Tim O'Brien's book best persuades me that he's giving us an account of what really took place, what really happen during the war.
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I could not stop highlighting this book, it was filled with such beautiful language. There were many things that struck out to me but what stuck to me most was O'Brien's fear of exile in the beginning of the novel: "It was a kind of schizophrenia. A moral split. I couldn't make up my mind. I feared the war, yes, but I also feared exile. I was afraid of walking away from my own life, my friends and my family, my whole history, everything that mattered to me. I feared losing the respect of my parents. I feared law. I feared ridicule and censure" (44-45). Little did Tim know that the feeling of exile would return to him even after he goes into the war, exile was inevitable for Tim: "Their deep bush tans, the sore and blisters,the stories, the in-it-togetherness. I felt close to them, yes, but I also felt a new sense of separation...You become a civilian. You forfeit membership in the family, the blood fraternity, and no matter how hard you try, you can't pretend to be part of it...That's how I felt-like a civilian-and it made me sad" (194). I find it ironic that O'Brien was expecting to escape exile by entering the war but he found himself exactly in the place he feared. O'Brien was extremely torn in his decision at the beginning of the novel and he is the same position at the end of the war. O' Brien describes his state as schizophrenia and i think that is so spot on, the whole novel is just a stream of so many different emotions, challenges, stories; all that contribute to the madness that entering the war resulted in.
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