Griffin Poff Mrs. Mitchell English III CP, period 4/5 8 March 2023 The Things They Carried: Tim O'Brien's connection to mental struggles caused by war Soldiers carry items through war. During war, they experience struggles that most people cannot comprehend. They carry those struggles throughout their lifetime. The Things They Carried represents not only the soldiers' physical items but also the mental trauma that comes with the war. Tim O'Brien saw these struggles firsthand. O’Brien writes about these struggles descriptively through the narrator's eyes of Tim O’Brien. During a time when people gained more knowledge of PTSD, Tim O’Brien wrote The Things They Carried about his personal experiences in Vietnam and the mental struggles they carried
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O’Brien was born into a middle-class family where his dad sold life insurance and his mom was a housewife (Wells 451). His father's name was William T. O’Brien and his mother's name was Ava Schulz O’Brien (“Tim”). In 1968 O’Brien graduated from Macalester College, where he earned a degree in political science and planned (“Tim”). Coming out of college O’Brien was anti-war. But when he got the draft card he could not handle the guilt of ducking the war and landed in Vietnam the following year (Smith, Tim). Before he went to Vietnam, he trained at Lewis, Washington, and served in the Alpha company (“Tim”). While O’Brien was in war he spent his time as an infantryman (Wells 451). “. O’Brien’s life in terms of the roles he has fulfilled: as son, soldier, and author. O’Brien has also been a brother, patriot, thinker, reader, friend, teacher, leader, and husband”(Watson 239). After the war in the year 1990 O’Brien published The Things They Carried, the novel showing the struggles that came with the war in Vietnam and the stooges of after-war …show more content…
As well, O’Brien’s work The Things They Carried is a well-known war novel. When the novel was released critics had things to say like, “At the time of publication, reviewers noted this novel’s ‘lean, vigorous style of O'Briens earlier books’;.”(Herzog, Tim 104). There was a certain order that O’Brein’s books got published, a critic says; “After publishing in 1985 his comic home-front novel about the Vietnam era, The Nuclear Age, O’Brien spent the next five years returning in his memory and imagination to the battlefields of If I Die and Going After Cacciato. He also returned to a short story, “Speaking of Courage,” that he had written for inclusion in Cacciato but removed because it dealt with a postwar veteran. The result is O’Brien’s third Vietnam War narrative, The Things They Carried (1990),.” (Herzog, Tim 104) This is the publishing order of O’Briens works. The novel competed for the Pulitzer Prize becoming a finalist (Herzog, Tim 104). The novel was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award (Watson 240). In 1990, the year of the publication of the book, it was well known and well
O’Brien was born into a middle-class family where his dad sold life insurance and his mom was a housewife (Wells 451). His father's name was William T. O’Brien and his mother's name was Ava Schulz O’Brien (“Tim”). In 1968 O’Brien graduated from Macalester College, where he earned a degree in political science and planned (“Tim”). Coming out of college O’Brien was anti-war. But when he got the draft card he could not handle the guilt of ducking the war and landed in Vietnam the following year (Smith, Tim). Before he went to Vietnam, he trained at Lewis, Washington, and served in the Alpha company (“Tim”). While O’Brien was in war he spent his time as an infantryman (Wells 451). “. O’Brien’s life in terms of the roles he has fulfilled: as son, soldier, and author. O’Brien has also been a brother, patriot, thinker, reader, friend, teacher, leader, and husband”(Watson 239). After the war in the year 1990 O’Brien published The Things They Carried, the novel showing the struggles that came with the war in Vietnam and the stooges of after-war …show more content…
As well, O’Brien’s work The Things They Carried is a well-known war novel. When the novel was released critics had things to say like, “At the time of publication, reviewers noted this novel’s ‘lean, vigorous style of O'Briens earlier books’;.”(Herzog, Tim 104). There was a certain order that O’Brein’s books got published, a critic says; “After publishing in 1985 his comic home-front novel about the Vietnam era, The Nuclear Age, O’Brien spent the next five years returning in his memory and imagination to the battlefields of If I Die and Going After Cacciato. He also returned to a short story, “Speaking of Courage,” that he had written for inclusion in Cacciato but removed because it dealt with a postwar veteran. The result is O’Brien’s third Vietnam War narrative, The Things They Carried (1990),.” (Herzog, Tim 104) This is the publishing order of O’Briens works. The novel competed for the Pulitzer Prize becoming a finalist (Herzog, Tim 104). The novel was also a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award (Watson 240). In 1990, the year of the publication of the book, it was well known and well