Lovely Literature

Ahh, juxtapositions! O'Brien loves these juxtapositions and figurative language.

"I was ashamed of my conscience, ashamed to be doing the right thing." [page 49]

"I was a coward. I went to the war."[page 58]

Ooh. That last one gets me for some reason. If you think about it...every single person is a coward at some point in their lives. The biggest cowards generally are the people we respect the most and whose hands we put our lives into. I'm not denying that they aren't brave, because I sure as heck respect all the people protecting me and my country and giving me the opportunity for the safe life I live because I know I couldn't do it. But somehow, being the biggest coward can make you brave.

How's that for a contradiction for you? Hm...ponder that one.

One last thing. Sometimes you have to fake it until you believe it [whatever "it" is]. I feel like that's exactly what O'Brien felt like he had to do.

When I read the first chapter, I believed the protagonist to be Lieutenant Jimmy Cross. Much to my surprise as I read on, I realized that Tim O'Brien was the true main character. He is the "hero" of the story who has good times, bad times, weaknesses, strengths, and confused feelings in this novel. I believe that O'Brien wrote this character based on himself and his war background with more truth than exaggeration on the things character O'Brien goes through.

"Twenty-one years old, an ordinary kid with all the ordinary dreams and ambitions, and all I wanted was to live the life I was born to-- a mainstream life..." [page 48]

O'Brien recounts on how he didn't want to have to turn into an adult until he absolutely had to. He was forced into making difficult decisions before he felt like he was ready. He was simply searching for himself in a world that was requiring him to stand up and fight for his liberty. O'Brien's flaw, that I'm hoping will not be fatal, is that he is afraid of war. Basically, he's a human with feelings.

Though he is not the protagonist, Elroy Berdahl has quickly become my favorite character in this novel. He is certainly the "speak softly and carry a big stick" type who does not feel it is his place to meddle. Berdahl is a round character of sorts because he displays complex feelings that are more than one dimensional. He was a god-like figure in O'Brien's journey--he gave him the opportunity to choose between Canada and the war. My favorite quote in O'Brien's description follows:

"One evening, just at sunset, he pointed up at an owl circling over the violet-lighted forest to the west. 'Hey, O'Brien,' he said. 'There's Jesus.' " [page 47]

This quote exemplifies all that Berdahl represents. He is a faithful, polite man who sees boundaries and does not cross them in respect to the people he meets. Even though he was more elderly [81] and O'Brien never came in contact with him again, he changed O'Brien's life during those six days he stayed at Tip Top Lodge.

O'Brien goes through internal wars with himself throughout various chapters of the book, but a prominent conflict is on pages 42 and 43,

"It was a moral split. I couldn't make up my mind. I feared the war, yes, but I also feared exile. I was afraid of walking away from my own life, my friends and my family, my whole history, everything that mattered to me." [page 42]

O'Brien's internal conflict sprang up from his inability to choose war or flight. He didn't want to fight in a war that he didn't believe in--quite understandable in my opinion. He believed that if one supported the war, that one should fight. So here he was, Uncle Sam tugging on his right arm and Canada tugging on his left. He was stuck because his country didn't understand the war anymore than he did. This had to have ripped him apart inside because he did not share his emotions with anyone. O'Brien is excellent at capturing the audience by appealing to actual human sense. He shows that his character O'Brien was nervous and scared while torn between a life-altering decision-- all of which are typical human traits.

So far, I've noticed that O'Brien loves his literary devices. I'm still not very far into the book, but I've found a great extended metaphor he uses to compare the military men to actors.

"It wasn't cruelty, just stage presence. They were actors. When someone died, it wasn't just dying, because in a curious way it seemed scripted, and because they had their lines mostly memorized, irony mixed with tragedy, and because they called it by other names, as if to encyst and destroy the reality of death itself," [page 19].

O'Brien's metaphor elaborates on how commonly accepted death has become in the military. One day a soldier can be saving a fellow soldier, and the next day, that hero is dead. Since it happens in the blink of an eye, how can they even prepare for death? I've come to the conclusion that being a soldier prepares one not only for battle, but also for death. Depressing, huh?

I'd also like to connect this to a post Alix Richardson recently wrote. She said that from previous knowledge, the war was extremely unpopular on the US homefront. While America was not fully behind entrance into the Vietnam war, they still supported the men who were deployed. O'Brien writes, "...they would never be at a loss for things to carry" [page 15], referring not only to the heavy burdens they were carrying, but also the lists of food, weaponry, and other supplies he wrote about just sentences before. America, while not open to the war, was still cognizant of their boys fighting their lives away.

Alright so since my past two blogs have been...well...pointless, I think I'm going to begin blogging about relevant topics.

I started The Things They Carried today, and while I'm not too far into it yet, I absolutely love it! I'm really happy to be able to say that because I haven't been able to say that about much of my required reading over the years.

Before work today I got through about half of the first chapter, and here is a quote that really stuck out to me,

`"They carried all they could bear, and then some, including a silent awe for the terrible power of the things they carried" [page 7].

That quote got to me. I read it over and over trying to imagine how it felt to carry so many destructive, life-altering weapons. What is it like to be able to control a person, a city, or even a country's outcome with just the pull of a trigger? Honestly, it scares the heck out of me, and it just increases my respect for the soldiers fighting for us.

The first chapter is titled "The Things They Carried," and I was pleasantly surprised to find that the majority of the first chapter is a series of lists (I love lists!!! :] ). The description O'Brien provides as the author speaking of Lieutenant Jimmy Cross' past is so thorough that the reader feels that he/she is more directly involved in the war effort. Not only were these soldiers carrying the weight of their weapons, but they were carrying the weight of their country, the safety of their families and loved ones, their pride and honor, and one anothers' lives. Talk about some heavy burdens to bear...

Well that's all for now!
I might even write more tonight! :]

This post isn't really worth a full number because I just wanted to write something else on here. The current boring factor of my blog is making me depressed.

I have decided to finally begin reading my books that I have had sitting on my desk untouched for a few weeks. It's funny how I've already finished multiple books this summer, and yet required reading just makes me queasy. Just kidding. It won't be that bad--I'm actually looking forward to these books! :]

Okay so back to something relevant. I've chosen The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien to read first. Wish me luck!