Friday, May 4, 2012
Now that we're finished with Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, do you feel like you personally have a better understanding of, or insight into the lives of soldiers in the Vietnam War? Have any of your opinions about the war changed? Has O'Brien succeeded in giving his readers better understanding of the war, despite his story's fictional nature?
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I believe O'Brien has succeeded in having his readers better understand war. Though some of the stories may not be true they still convey true emotions that help the reader to try to understand what war was like. I think it gives us insight to solders and does effect our opinions of war. Before reading this story if i read the article we read about the soldiers in class I would think their actions were absolutely inexcusable and awful. Now though I still think what they did was terrible I have a better understanding for they are going through which makes me understand their actions. I think O'Brien has done a good job in expressing war and its understanding even though the stories may not be 100% true.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the book, I think that I better understand the emotional trauma and moral confusion that soldiers faced during the Vietnam War and also war in general. It provides a unique perspective, like Lauren said, that will change how I view current issues facing soldiers and how I judge the situation and their actions. After reading about all of the moral conflict that O'Brien wrote about in "The Man I Killed", I realized that soldiers had to distance themselves from their actions and their emotions to do their job. Also because of the book, I judged the part where the whole platoon except O'Brien went around shaking hands with the bodies of the people they had killed very differently than I would have if I had just read that story alone.
ReplyDeleteI agree with both Lauren and Katie that O'Brien helped me to understand the emotional trauma that soldiers from not only the Vietnam War went through but really any soldier. Although he didn't really change my opinion on the topic he did heighten my understanding of the reasons behind the actions of soldiers. The book also helped me to understand the internal struggle that a soldier has once he leaves the war. I always knew that it wasn't easy for them because of all that they have been through, but this provided me with emotional details that you don't really hear about. Anyone can learn the facts and figures of the Vietnam War in a history textbook, but there never is really any connection made with readers from the generations after the war. However, I believe that all of the emotions presented to us in this book makes us truly understand all of the struggles that occurred during the war and after as well.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading The Things They Carried I feel like I do know more about the Vietnam war and about the soldiers that fought in it. Before reading this book I always remembered hearing things about the Vietnam war like the soldiers were drafted and were called baby killers and everything was a big mess. But after reading the book even though many of these beliefs were true there are also other things that I wasn't aware of. For example, the brotherhood that the soliders had and the memories of each solider and the specific roles and jobs they all had in order to stay alive and sane. Yes, many of my beliefs have changed. Yes, I believe that O'Brien has given his readers a better understanding of the Vietnam war and how the soliders fought along side of each other and he shows the reader how each individual soldier had not only a war going on in front of them but each soldier also had a war going on inside of their minds and their own miniature war inside of them.
ReplyDeleteI don't think anyone can truly understand what goes on in a soldier's life during war and also when they return. However, this book has certainly given me some insight on their trauma during and after the war. When Ms. Stuart initially brought up the soldiers in Iraq with their inappropriate pictures, I certainly judged them for being out of line. After reading what O'Brien and his fellow soldiers went through, I then understood the seduction of war and how we as citizens have no right to judge them. Although parts of this book were not true, I definitely believe that these emotions are true within the soldiers. The chapter "Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong" was the best chapter in my opinion, because it gave you a full story, beginning to end, and we saw how the war completely seduced Mary Anne. Even though we can never be sure if what O'Brien is saying is true, we know the feelings he conveys are true. This is what he tries to explain through the water buffalo story, that actions and events are not always as important as the emotions behind what happened.
ReplyDeletei definitely agree with Jayme that we can't truly capture how a soldier feels during the war, but O'Brien gets as close as a writer can. He tells amazing stories that really help to show us some of the feelings of a soldier. It really shows us why soldiers do the things that they do. It helps to make us read the as article about the soldiers in Afghanistan in a completely different way. When i originally heard about the soldiers i thought it was a completely horrible and insensitive thing to do, but now, after reading the things they carried i realize that it wasn't. Though there are moral issues that come up with the soldiers in afghanistan, i can now empathize with them in a way that i couldn't have before reading the things they carried.
ReplyDeleteThe Things They Carried is a fictional book but like Lauren explained the emotions that the book provokes is something that cannot be ignored. With that said I do not think that I could ever understand the lives of the soldiers in the Vietnam War or soldiers in general.
ReplyDeleteI think that is what O’Brien wanted us to realize and that is one thing that he struggles with throughout the book, is that no one will ever understand the war. After reading The Things They Carried I feel like I have a better understanding of thought process of the soldiers throughout the war and why soldiers may do things that we might look at as cruel when in reality they are coping
Before I read the book, I knew that the vietnam was a terrible war for the soldiers but I had only heard general description like "There were booby traps" and "burned whole forests to kill the enemy". The book gave me much more details about their daily lives. Also, I hadn't heard much about soldiers getting crazy because of things they witness. Even though I know that most of what O'Brien told us in the book is made up, i feel like there were a lot of similar stories that happened during the war.
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