The Things They Carried
by Tim O'Brien
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Book Reviews of The Things They Carried
Book Review: Erik's Review of The Things They Carried
Summary: 5 Stars
Tim O'Brien's book, The Things They Carried, is a scrapbook of experiences that convey the harsh realities and results of war. While the events are conveyed as one-related story, like entries in a scrapbook, each segment can be viewed independently as a separate event and tragedy. The horrendous, graphic, and tragic event of the Vietnam War swallows the young members of Jimmy Cross's platoon, including the narrator Tim O'Brien, and regurgitates them as emotionally and mentally transformed clones. The author graphically conveys the treasures and burdens, the gains and losses, the sadness and melancholy the soldiers experienced and the survivors privately relived. The physical and mental pain and scarring which opiates the lives of these young men, who were once upon a time vivacious, is vividly and sufficiently conveyed to make the reader consider adopting an anti-war philosophy. Therefore, this book merits a five star rating for literary importance.
The reader's heart strings are snagged when Tim O'Brien struggles as he sits in a boat, wrestling with himself, in order to make "the right" decision. He prognosticates, projecting how everyone else will feel if he engages in sedition by fleeing the country and avoiding his duty. An irony is conveyed here because the message is that one should be proud to kill on the country's behalf, rather than flee and preserve lives; suggesting that life has less value then death. Tim O'Brien goes to war and is so transformed that he becomes an ennui, unable to tell his story.
As the scrapbook develops, portraying the soldiers' encounters, the author successfully illustrates the extreme, violent, quixotic, and horrific behavior they engage in so that they can be readily accepted back home and not embarrassed. Yet, ironically, after fulfilling their duty to country, these physically and emotionally scarred young men return to a world that neither accepts nor understands them, leaving them feeling guilty and embarrassed for how they have become. Emotionally, they live an ambulatory life; moving around but never fitting in.
The author paints a picture of the weirdness and surreal experiences of war with his portrayal of Mary Ann Bell. The reader is to believe that soldier Mark Fossie brought his girlfriend, described as a wholesome, young, American girl, to war-torn Viet Nam. However, once there, Bell transforms into a wanton, survivalist, jungle Amazonian who wears necklaces made of human tongues. This depiction is an extreme portrayal to illustrate the indescribable and unexpected experiences of these young soldiers. Beyond the essentials for survival that the soldiers carried, they also carried the oddity of the experience and came away carrying the emotional rollercoaster they rode for life.
Book Review: O'Brien Cuts To the Core Of Our Fragile Lives
Summary: 5 Stars
In The Things They Carried, Vietnam veteran Tim O'Brien called upon his own wartime experiences, labeled them as fiction, and wrote one of the most emotionally potent books I've ever read.
It's irrelevant to me how much of O'Brien's book "really happened" because O'Brien's words and stories in The Things They Carried deeply touched me. O'Brien wrote simply, but effectively. He tapped into real emotion and conveyed those emotions skillfully. With each and every short that made up a larger story with The Things They Carried, I could picture myself clear as day in those very same situations.
That's one benefit of calling this book fiction. Had O'Brien designated it nonfiction, I think each tale would have filtered through my knowledge this happened to O'Brien and registered as a "past event." But with it being called fiction, I could lose myself in the story and meld with it, become one with it, and see myself in it. It allowed me ownership that nonfiction does not.
While O'Brien offers authentic knowledge on weaponry, tactics, and all things associated with being a wartime soldier, he focuses more deeply upon the human element. The Things They Carried perfectly captures what it is to be human in times of chaos, fear, and horror. He doesn't glorify or lionize the characters in his stories. He treats them as "real" (and perhaps they were), and he offers only the emotional truth.
There are things in this book that chilled me to the bone. Not because it's overtly gory, but because O'Brien cuts to the core of our fragile lives. For instance, in one story a man dies after being sucked under mud during a mortar attack. But he doesn't write it from the dead man's perspective, he writes it first from the perspective of the man next to him, then from the perspective of the man pulling the body out of the mud the next day. Can you imagine? I assure you, you'll be able to imagine such a thing after reading The Things They Carried. And that's what makes this book so utterly effective. O'Brien forces you to put yourself in it, to experience it through his straightforward, transparent, and evocative words.
I honestly only read this book because Tim O'Brien was coming to a local university and I was invited to attend a private reception for him. I'd never heard of the man and had to ask a few friends for suggestions before one knew O'Brien's work and told me to read The Things They Carried. So expertly rendered were O'Brien's words and so powerful was the raw emotional honesty in his book that O'Brien has secured me as a life-long reader.
I strongly recommend you read The Things They Carried.
~Scott William Foley, author of Souls Triumphant
Book Review: A must read book
Summary: 5 Stars
Tim O'Brien's novel, The Things They Carried, is a book which lets the reader learn more about Vietnam. It is a story about the stories of one man's visit to Vietnam. The narrator who is the author proves how story telling can help understand situations and can also help get over situations. O'Brien intended writing this book for anyone who enjoys war stories or wants to learn more about the war in Vietnam. He is writting this book to give people an understanding of Vietnam and show people how powerful story telling can be. I enjoyed this novel because I was compelled through the whole story and beacause there is more to the story than just war.The novel takes place in Veitnam during the war. Vietnam is in South East Asia and its climate hot. A lot of the land is covered with rainforests and that is where some of the fighting occurs. There is also a lot of rain. Tim tells the reader about the setting of the book. He also is a gifted storyteller. He believes that the story can be more important than the truth. If you read the book he will prove this point.
The Things They Carried is really a collection of short stories. Some of the stories go with the next chapter but most stories are summed up in one chapter. The stories touch upon the awful side of war and the lives of the men the with the narrator in war. There was one story I especially liked. It was about the narrator killing a Vietnamese man. The narrator shares with the reader the thoughts of a person in war. He says how dificult it was for him to kill the man. In this quote, Kiowa is trying to console Tim; "Tim, it's a war. The guy wasn't Heidi - he had a weapon. It's a tough thing, for sure, but you got to stop dwelling over it(126,O'Brien)." This quote shows how his friends wanted Tim to stop thinging about killing a man and to get over it to live the rest of his life. Tim had a very hard time with it. This is just one of the fascinating stories in the novel.
The Things They Carried was a very intersesting and riveting novel. I was fascinated by the way the author broke the book up into separate stories. It kept me interested, unlike most stories that have parts that are boring. In the last two chapters O'Brien ties everything together to separate the book from the typical war novel. If you like good literature you will like this book becuase Tim O'Brien is a great story teller. Do not let the title deceive you. There is more to this book than just the weapons and other things soldiers must carry. Tim accomplishes his purpose of writing his book. If you are wanting to read a good book, I highly recommend The Things They Carried.
Book Review: kaylie carmon
Summary: 3 Stars
"The Things They Carried" catalogs the variety of things his fellow soldiers in the Alpha Company brought on their missions.Throughout the collection, the same characters reappear in various stories. Ted Lavender, a "grunt," or low-ranking soldier, who deals with his anxiety about the war by taking tranquilizers and smoking marijuana.He gets shot in the head on his way back from going to the bathroom, and his superior, Lieutenant Jimmy Cross, blames himself for the tragedy.Cross is distracting himself with thoughts of Martha, a college crush. It is revealed in "Love" that Cross's feelings for Martha, whom he dated once before leaving for Vietnam, but doesnt shaere the same feelings.In "On the Rainy River," the narrator, O'Brien, explains the series of events that led him to Vietnam in the first place. He receives his draft notice in June of 1968, and his feelings of confusion drive him north to the Canadian border, which he contemplates crossing so that he will not be forced to fight in a war in which he doesn't believe. Sitting in a rowboat with the proprietor of the Tip Top Lodge, where he stays, O'Brien decides that his guilt about avoiding the war and fear of disappointing his family are more important than his political convictions. He soon leaves, going first back home to Worthington, Minnesota and later to Vietnam.
a few other members of the Alpha Company are killed during their mission overseas, including Curt Lemon, who is killed when using a grenade to play catch with the medic, Rat Kiley. Though O'Brien is not close to Lemon, in "The Dentist," he tells a story of how Lemon, who faints before a routine checkup with an army-issued dentist, tries to save face by insisting that a perfectly good tooth be pulled. Lee Strunk, another member of the company, dies from injuries he sustains by stepping on a landmine. In "Friends," O'Brien remembers that before Strunk was fatally hurt, Strunk and Dave Jensen had made a pact that if either man were irreparably harmed, the other man would see that he was quickly killed. However, when Strunk is actually hurt, he begs Jensen to spare him, and Jensen complies. Instead of being upset by the news of his friend's swift death en route to treatment, Jensen is relieved. In the last story, "The Lives of the Dead," O'Brien gives another twist to his contention that stories have the power to save people. In the stories of Curt Lemon and Kiowa, O'Brien explains that his imagination allowed him to grapple successfully with his guilt and confusion over the death of his fourth-grade first love, Linda.
As you can see this story mostly takes place in the war at vietneam.
Book Review: Fantastic War Story
Summary: 5 Stars
The Things They Carried Book Review
The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien is an account of the Vietnam War and is told with a mixture fiction and reality. Along with a prolixity of powerful Vietnam tales O'Brien explains the difference between "story truth" and "happening truth". The Things They Carried obfuscates the importance of "happening truth" and displays the febrile necessity and healing powers of "story truth". O'Brien's strong veracity in his storytelling opens reader's eyes and allows them to truly see what the Vietnam War was really like. The Things They Carried is not a pedagogue story that will put you to sleep but a tale that will be expounded in your mind.
Anything but prodigal is Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried. This tale of love, danger, guilt, pain, and war can succor anyone in their quest to understand the Vietnam War and what the soldiers endured. O'Brien transgression between first and third person aid in helping the reader analyze what the war was like for not only the character of O'Brien but also the other soldiers. The quote, "war is fear cloaked in coura ge" by William Westmoreland accurately describes O'Briends feelings towards war and what motivates the soldiers. It is impossible not to feel solicitous when reading of the nonplussed protagonist's confusion towards the war. O'Brien sees only two options whether to succumb to social norms and fight in a war he doesn't believe in or furtively flee to Canada. Ultimately unwilling to disappoint and embarrass his family O'Brien leaves to fight in the Vietnam War. In addition, O'Brien recalls how unmitigated soldiers he knew had trouble finding meaning in their lives after the war and how one even hung himself. Twenty years after the war 43 years old O'Brien, the Picasso of war story tellers, still experiences guilt. Writing is like therapy to O'Brien and unlike veterans such as Norman Bowker he is able to cope with his painful memories.
Chapter such as "The Man I killed" vivify the iniquities the Vietnam soldiers went through. For the first time in my life I was able to feel sagacious towards their circumstances and could finally see why20the war veterans I know act the way they do. Before I read this story, and I would judge the cold war veteran I know, I had no idea the events and experiences he had been through. However, The Things They Carried opened my mind and helped me be less judgmental and more understanding of a time I have not experienced. The Things They Carried is a literary masterpiece that is a must read for anyone interested in understanding the Vietnam War and its veterans.