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Defending the Principles of the Nation:
Analysis of O’Brien’s The Things They
Carried
When one thinks of a nation, specifically
one they belong to, feelings of pride stir up; pride that originates in an idea.
A citizen is grounded in the belief of an idea. This idea is so extraordinary
that it unites citizenry in profound ways. Being born into a nation is a
privilege that enlists all citizens to carry out and defend the ideologies of
the nation. When the idea is threatened, the whole nation is threatened and is
dealt with, sometimes severely. Because of obligatory duties, a citizen is
drafted to fight, conquer, and murder the enemy to uphold the principles of the
nation. For the fortunate citizens who do not get drafted into fighting
ambiguous battles, little is known of the emotional and mental consequences of
going into the battlefield. For those who experienced such battles, there is a
challenge in successfully relaying the inexplicable experiences of their
conquest. Thus literature is relied upon for shaping and communicating the formless
feelings ruminating deep within a soldier of a nation.
In The Things They Carried, by Tim O’ Brien, there is an attempt at
communicating to the reader the individual experiences of going into a war in a
distant country legitimized by the ideologies of nationalism. The way O’Brien
communicates this notion is very interesting in the way the story is structured.
There are several lists within the story. Listing and itemizing the tangible things each of the soldiers carried is
emphasized down to its specific weight and detail, for example;
“The
things they carried were largely determined by necessity. Among the necessities
or near necessities were P-38 can openers, pocket knives, heat tabs, wrist
watches, dog tags, mosquito repellant, chewing gum, candy, cigarettes, salt
tablets, packets of Kool-Aid, lighters, matches, sewing kits, Military Payment
Certificates, C rations, and two or three canteens of water. Together, these
items weighed between fifteen and twenty pounds.” (O’Brien, 238)
The
reader is bombarded from the beginning with a long list of tangibles. The
narrator lists these items in no specific order, however it is up to the reader
to compile an image in their mind. The lists of tangibles go on and on in the
story and with it the compilations of images are added to the reader’s imagination
giving an impression of the severe weight the soldiers carried. Accordingly,
enacting the reader to be weighed down as the story progresses.
As the story develops, there are
interesting shifts that occur throughout. A very important feature to the structure
of the story is the interchanging descriptions of tangible to the intangible
things/thoughts the characters are carrying. Because of the apt attention to
detailing the tangibles, when the shift occurs to the intangible and emotional
weight it suggests an understanding that the tangible and intangible are
comparable and synonymous with one another. The reader views the characters
tied to materials that are parceled with deep and personal memory of their
homes and personal lives. Ted Lavender, the victim of circumstance, carried
tranquilizers and was also “scared”. Kiowa, a devout Baptist, carried a New
Testament, but also “carried his grandmother’s distrust of the white man.”
(238) However, the main character that is most impressed upon the reader is
First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross. Cross carried many tangibles, but also carried an
infatuation of a girl named Martha. Furthermore, the narrator implicates the
dangers of carrying such cumbersome loads of both tangibles and more
importantly intangible things.
“To
carry something was to “hump” it, as when Lieutenant Jimmy Cross humped his
love for Martha up the hills and through the swamps. In its intransitive form,
“to hump” meant “to walk,” or “to march,” but it implied burdens far beyond the
intransitive.” (238)
To truly convey to the reader the
gravities of weight the soldiers carried, O’Brien employs vivid and visceral
imagery. The scene of Ted Lavender being shot and killed reveals the
“exceptional burden” carried by him. The narrator describes his death along
with everything he carried, “plus the unweighed fear.” Once again, the
tangibles are juxtaposed with the intangible weight that burdened Ted Lavender
and provided him a death that was “like watching a rock fall or a big sandbag,”
as Kiowa who witnessed his death describes. The description by Kiowa of
Lavender’s death continues in illustrating this it was “not like the movies
where the dead guy rolls around and does fancy spins…the poor bastard just
flat-fuck fell. Boom. Down.” (239) There is a very important element to realism
in Kiowa’s description. The way Lavender died instills an image of a heavy and
solid force pounding the ground that conveys a very true and real sense of the
burdens these soldiers carry up until their end.
It is not enough that the story
imparts imagery to convey the weight of the characters, but also must employ
the deep ruminating thoughts of the characters to truly inculcate what is at
stake for the characters. The omniscient narrator becomes valuable in the sense
that the reader is taken into the deepest depths of each character, especially
with the main character and protagonist, Jimmy Cross. The tangible object of
the pebble Martha gives Cross as a good luck charm becomes a much heavier
weight as it continually conjures up thoughts that drift him away into another
plane of existence,
“he
carried the pebble in his mouth, turning it with his tongue, tasting sea salts
and moisture. His mind wandered. He had difficulty keeping his attention on
war… he would slip away into daydreams, just pretending, walking barefoot along
the Jersey shore, with Martha, carrying nothing. He would feel himself rising.
Sun and waves and gentle winds, all love and lightness.” (239)
In
this passage the physical object evokes memory and longing. Cross is taken away
from the realities that surround him and lifts him. He feels himself rising,
shedding the weight of war. However, this fantasy soon becomes more of a burden
than he bargained for. The day of Lavender’s death, Cross awaits Lee Strunk who
is on a routine inspection of a tunnel. During this time, without him “willing
it”, Cross was compelled into thought about Martha. Rather than making Cross
feel lifted like before, he felt a “dense, crushing love”. He wished to be
buried under “all that weight” of love with Martha. Shortly after, in an
instant Lavender was killed and Cross inwardly took the blame, adding to the
weight of burden felt by him, which “he would have to carry like a stone in his
stomach for the rest of the war.” (241)
Following Lavender’s death the
narrator again itemizes the tangibles and intangibles of the things the
characters carry, however it is a bit different in its description because now
it is what they collectively carry and what burdens they share together. Along
with “USO stationary pencils and pens” they carry invisible things like
infections and diseases, such as malaria and dysentery. Moreover, the narrator
states, “They carried the land itself – Vietnam, the place, the soil…They
carried the sky. The whole atmosphere, they carried it…they carried gravity.
They moved like mules.” (241) They are the beasts of burden, collectively
carrying the entire nation on their backs. This notion is concluded at the end
of the paragraph of which the previous quoted passage was taken. As the
resupply choppers arrived, they were brought “fresh watermelons, crates of
ammunition…sparklers for the Fourth of July, colored eggs for Easter. The great
American war chest.” All of which they carried on their backs and shoulders
“for the ambiguities of Vietnam.” (241) The sparklers, watermelons, and the
colored eggs represent the national symbols to remind them where they come from
and that idea they are fighting and
dying for, adding further tangible and intangible weight to their bodies and
minds. These passages clearly and eloquently explicate the chief and resounding
message towards the reader of the true weight and haul these soldiers carry on
behalf of an ambiguous conquest in a foreign land.
Towards the end of the story and in
a climactic scene, the narrator describes the “freedom birds” that will carry
the soldiers beyond the war, nation, and the world, which jettisons the burdens
and obligations carried by them in their experiences of war. As the jumbo jet
takes off and starts flying the narrator states, “They were taken up over the
clouds and the war, beyond duty, beyond gravity and mortification, and global
entanglements.” Throughout the scene,
lightness is emphasized. The weights and burdens fall off as they sail over the
“mountains and oceans, over America, over the farms and great sleeping cities
and cemeteries and highways and the golden arches of McDonalds.” (243) Once
again, the narrator uses listing, but as a way of shedding the weight that the
soldiers carry. They are taken above the land, the nation, and the complications
of global conflict.
O’Brien’s task of communicating the
feelings and experiences is transferred to the reader quite successfully by the
end of this story. There is no doubt left within the reader of the figurative
weight that the Vietnam soldiers carry. O’Brien’s message endures across
temporal and regional paradigms. The story of burden is something that is not
necessarily new to literature, but it is something that must be communicated
for those who will never experience an ambiguous global conflict far away from
home.
Works Cited
O'Brien, Tim. The Things They
Carried. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1990. Print.
Reprinted
in The Short Story (Eng 180H). Chandra: University of California, Berkeley 2012.
