The Things They Carried by Tim OBrien Essay Example for Free

The Things They Carried by Tim OBrien EssayTim OBrien, author and veteran, covers several multiple in his novel The Things They Carried. The entertain bases itself on the psychological strain caused by the stress and conflicting interests in the fight. OBrien wants us to see what hes afraid to discover back at. Story truth is his course of facing the confronting the past and admitting his responsibility in it. OBrien retells his stories from a aeonian gush of memories. Emotions and morals are among the more evident themes covered in the novel. Pain, embarrassment, love, hate, loneliness, frustration, isolation, bravery, and struggles with morality. All of these, and combinations of these are sacredly covered in the book. Though people not involved in a struggle could never even begin to understand, not even an ounce of what happened OBrien uses these themes and emotions to help describe the crude and passionate feelings that the veterans mat throughout the war.Pain is one of the better k without delay feelings well-nigh Vietnam. It still discovers m all(a) Vietnam War veterans in many forms. Even though the war ended over 25 years ago, OBrien shows that the trauma associated with the war has had mental and physical effects on the soldiers since the war has passed. Because of this pain, it only makes sense that OBrien illustrates and reflects on the pains he and others felt during the war. Pain is caused by so many of the emotions used in this book, that it becomes difficult not to support its signifi piece of assce in the book. The guilt caused by killing a man, even though he would ready killed you. The mental torment felt when watching your comrade being scraped off of a tree. They were just goofing. in that location was a noise, I suppose, which mustve been the detonator, so I glanced behind me and watched Lemon step from the shade into bright sunlight. His governance was suddenly brown and shining. A handsome kid, really. Sharp gray eyes , lean and narrow-waisted, and when he died it was almost beautiful, the way the sunlight came around him and lifted him up and sucked him high into a tree full of moss and vines and white blossoms. (OBrien p.70). These are the types of pains that can only be understood by having felt them yourself, the type of pain that have sexs thickset within you forever, whether you want to remember it or not.Embarrassment was probably one of the more hidden feelings in the war. In thechapter titled On the Rainy River, OBrien tells of something so deeply embarrassing, that he was too ashamed to tell even his closest friends, and family. He, being an anti-war individual at the time, would rationally claim been opposed to fighting for a cause he didnt believe in. He ran. Running was a popular choice for those who were opposed to, or just scared of, war. At some point in mid-July I began thinking seriously roughly Canada. The border lay a few hundred miles north, and eight-hour drive. Both my conscience and my instincts were telling me to make a break for it, just take off and run corresponding hell and never stop.(OBrien p.44).In the book he fled to the border, but stopped to rest before he crossed. His rest was the duration of six days. He was in a continuous battle with his conscience. He thought of his parents, the shame they would be faced with because of their sons weakness. He could hear his townspeople and peers mocking him. He couldnt risk the embarrassment. He submitted. I would go to war-I would kill any maybe did-because I was too embarrassed not too.(OBrien p.59.).The emotion considered by many to be the strongest of all emotions, was the focus, and title of the second chapter. Love tells of a young lieutenant, and the object of his affection, a girl from his hometown, Martha. Among the things in which lieutenant Cross humped were two photographs, a good luck pebble, and letters from Martha. Lieutenant Cross unbroken to himself. He pictured Marthas smooth young face, thinking he loved her more than anything, more than his men, and now Ted Lavender was dead because he loved her so much and could not stop thinking about her.(OBrien p.7). When emotions like love make you think more of home, and less of the war, mistakes are inevitable they simply affect your ability to work. Lieutenant Cross found this out the hard way. He burned Marthas pictures and letters. He would have to carry the institutionalise of his mistakes, regret.A struggle with ones morality could be expected for any man. It all came vote out to one question. Am I willing to kill another man? Should I kill and live with the heavy guilt and burden on my conscience, or perish knowing the consequences youd be faced with would be worse. OBrien made a choice, he chose to live, and kill, and kill he did. In the chapter The Man I scratch offed OBrien reminisces over this experience. His vanquish was in his throat, hisupper lip and teeth were gone, his one eye was shut, his o ther eye was a angulate hole, his eyebrows were thin and arched like a womans, his nose was undamaged, there was a slight tear at the lobe of one ear, his clean black hair was swept upward into a cowlick at the rear of the skull, his brow was lightly freckled, his fingernails were clean, the skin at his left cheek was peeled back in three molest strips, his right cheek was smooth and hairless, there was a butterfly on his chin, his neck was open to the spinal anesthesia cord and the blood there was thick and shiny and it was this wound that had killed him.(OBrien p.124). Following his experience, he imagined what the mans life had been like before this. His memories created an existence for whom he killed. Memories are what kept them alive. He is astounded by what he has done, by what he had been forced to do.This novel, summarized, is about a young soldier who is overwhelmed by emotions and feelings about a war he wants nothing to do with. It conveys nearly every emotion that o ne can experience. It is because of these themes that people can even begin to understand what those living the war felt. As with most other veterans, OBrien experienced a loss so great, a burden so heavy, it is almost impossible to carry, but carry they did. They carried the burden of murders, the embarrassment of running, the bodies of their friends, and the memories that would haunt them for a lifetime. For these veterans the war will never end.Bonn, Maria S., Can Stories Save Us? Tim OBrien and the Efficacy of the Text, in Critique Studies in Contemporary Fiction, Vol. 36, No. 1, Fall, 1994, pp. 2-14.Harris, Robert R., Too Embarrassed Not to Kill A review of The Things They Carried, in New York Times Book Review, March 11, 1990, p. 8.