In the book titled, The Things They Carried, the antecedent, Tim O? Brien, depicts a world where traumatic memories and suppression emotional baggage ar far heavier than whatsoever invade pack or assortment of weapons that has ever cloged the destructionorse of a spend. The author, O?Brien, explores the personal and emotional burdens that the spends of the Vietnam War ? come? or nurse with them. The author portrays the things the soldiers slobber byout the myth as both liter solelyy tangible items and figur solelyy intangible plus burdens. The reader is able to learn a great deficiency about the soldiers and their character by analyzing the things they take in during warfare. However, the story is non so much about the somatic things the men of important keep company scat, only if rather the emotional burdens that ar non easily left-hand(a) behind. The image of carrying is conveyed d angiotensin-converting enzyme the lading of the strong-arm items t he soldiers ? hunch overed?, and finished the metaphysical burdens of: escaping reality, fear, brokenheartedness, love, and the responsibility for one some other. The bakers dozen troops of the alpha Company and their Lt. Jimmy grumpy ar portrayal of puppylike Ameri mass soldiers that bear the burden of the physical and metaphysical things they carry or ?hump? during the Vietnam War. And?among the necessities or near-necessities were P-38 place openers, pocket knives, rouse tabs, wristwatches, dog tags, mosquito repellent, chewing gum, candy, cig arttes, salt tablets, packets of Kool-Aid, lighters, matches, fasten kits, Military compensation Certificates, C rations, and two or ternary canteens of water? (OBrien 2). These items can recognize the soldiers pack weigh up to twenty pounds, on with other undeniable items for vindication. It was SOP, or metre operating procedure, for both soldiers to wear jungle boots deliberateness 2.1 pounds, a steel helmet weighing 5 pounds, and a nylon covered hood weighing 6! .7 pounds. In do-gooder to the angle of their gear wheel, they still had to occlude around guns, unnecessary ammunition, plus special supplies depending on their flowing mission. It is common for soldiers to carry up to half their system of packs in what they consider necessary supplies. All of these items serve as vindication unless withal embody the charge of what the soldiers physically had to hump in vow to survive. Along with the load of the procedural items, e real soldier carries his testify personal items, which convey the image of carrying in a figurative scent out. The personal items the soldiers carry symbolize a means of cut out from reality. For example: Henry Dobbins carries extra rations of peaches in big(a) syrup to eat with pound cake, which exemplify his escape furthert to his mothers kitchen. Ted lavender carries tranquilizers, and marijuana to escape the pain and accidental stigma of the war. Michell Sanders carries condoms as a symbol of sex in which he uses to escape the harsh realities and the fear of death. Norman Bowker carries a journal as his outlet to purge himself of the horror that surrounds him. Rat kiley escapes war through his imagi population by carrying comic books. In order to escape the realities of war, he enters a fantasy nation that reminds him of his childhood back in America. Kiowa carries a Bible as a reminder of his faith, and is able to escape the horrors of war through spirituality. The author allows the reader to conceptualize the personal items the soldiers carry as a means of escape, but also as a false sense of fortress to cope with their fears of war. For example: Kiowa carries along with his Bible, moccasins for silence, as his personal illusion of safety. However, the moccasins lead not necessitate back his silence, but the noise incurred by all of his gear will. Dave Jensen carries unilluminatedness vision vitamins which are high in beta-carotene. Again, the vitamins will not greatly improve his vision in the dark jungles of Vie! tnam. Yet, the vitamins are necessary because they offer Jensen a false sense of protection and an escape from fear. Lt. Cross carries a good hazard pebble addicted to him by Martha, his love back home. Jensen carries a rabbits foot, and Norman Bowker carries the divide thumb of a dead Vietcong. However, these items prove to be none other than the opposite of protection from safety, they offer protection from reality. figuratively speaking, the soldiers carry their personal items along with an armor of smoke. The weight of the things the soldiers carry only births heavier as the story progresses. The author offers a decent amount of detail for the reader to visualize the weight of the things the soldiers end up carrying throughout the whole war, both trustworthy(a)ly and figuratively. ?They carr[y] all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing - these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity, they had tangibl e weight? (O?Brien 21). And with the increase of the burden of grief the soldiers feel, came responsibility. Lt. Cross best exemplifies a soldier that carries both the burden of grief and responsibility. Cross carries the biggest responsibility of the soldiers, which are the men in his platoon. However, his preoccupation with his love for Martha leads to the death of Ted Lavender, and then Cross carries the burden and weight of grief due to his get out out of responsibility. He was grieving for Ted Lavender, but mostly for Martha, and for himself, because she belong[s] to another world...and because he [realizes] she [does] not love him and never [will] (O?Brien 220). Cross? burden of grief from the loss of both Martha and Lavender, change his character for the better. Lavender?s death shows him the error in his ways, and that he cannot carry the weight of grief and guilt during a time of war along with carrying the responsibility for the lives of his men. With emphasis, the au thor symbolizes? Lt. Cross?s very parent. This allus! ion to the Bible, and to the literal image of the cross, represents the greatest burden that has ever been carried. Lt. Cross? name sake serves as an allegory to the Nazarene. Cross, as Christ did, moldiness carry the weight of all of his men upon his shoulders. He is trustworthy for the outcome of their lives. The weight of responsibility that Lt. Cross carries is one of the heaviest of burdens that the author expresses throughout the book. The Things They Carried is no other than a true war story, told by a Vietnam War veteran himself. the likes of the Alpha Company, Tim O?Brien and all the soldiers that served during the Vietnam War carried various items, whether it is was the weight of their equipment, or the burden of carrying their friend?s dead body. each(prenominal) soldier endured not only the weight of the physical items, but practise the mental and emotional weight the war added to them. The weight of the physical and metaphysical things the soldiers carried left them one hope, to shift the weight and make it bearable enough to survive. Works CitedO?Brien, Tim. The Things They Carried. New York : Broadway Books, 1990. If you necessitate to get a full essay, order it on our website: OrderCustomPaper.com
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