Foreign Media Coverage on War
The Things They Carried is a collection of stories about the Vietnam War that the author, Tim O’Brien, uses to convey his experiences and feelings about the war. ... O’Brien captures the reader with graphic descriptions of the war that make one feel as if they were in Vietnam. ... To O’Brien the novel is not only a compilation of stories, but also a release of the fears, sadness, and anger that he has felt because of the Vietnam War. One of the significant concepts in The Things They Carried is that of the importance of certain objects or feelings used by the soldiers of Alpha Company to survive the war. ... All the items helped the respective soldier to survive from day to day and to continue fighting the war. ... This bond that the soldiers form helped them to survive, excluded someone who was outside their group, and helped the men of Alpha Company to cope with the war after they returned to the United States. ... If this happened while he was in the battlefield, the Narrator might not have survived the war. ... When the soldiers returned from the war they find a country that does not want to talk about the war and is even trying to forget it happened. ... (O’Brien, 179) The soldiers feel that the only people they can talk to about the war are their “brothers”, the other men who experienced the Vietnam War. ... By talking to each other, the soldiers help to sort out the incidents that happened in the War and to put these incidents behind them.