RE: O’Brien “The Things They Carried”, answer questions

There needs to be written answers to the following questions as journals. They can be written as small paragraphs or bigger paragraphs.

“How to Tell a True War Story”

List the narrator’s comments about what constitutes a true war story. What do you think these competing and contradictory ideas finally add up to?

“Ambush”

In this chapter, O’Brien says that he keeps writing war stories because he did kill someone in Vietnam. In what ways is the title “Ambush” significant?

“Speaking of Courage” and“Notes”

What is the effect of “notes,” in which O’Brien explains the story behind “Speaking of Courage”? Does your appreciation of the story change when you learn which parts are “true” and which are the author’s invention?

“In the Field”

O’Brien writes, “When a man died, there had to be blame.” What does this mandate do to the men of O’Brien’s company? Are they justified in thinking themselves at fault? How do they cope with their own feelings of culpability?

“The Lives of the Dead”

On the copyright page of one edition of the novel appears the following: “This is a work of fiction. Except for a few details regarding the author’s own life, all the incidents, names and characters are imaginary.” How does this statement affect your reading of the novel?

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“The Lives of the Dead”

On the copyright page of one edition of the novel appears the following: “This is a work of fiction. Except for a few details regarding the author’s own life, all the incidents, names and characters are imaginary.” How does this statement affect your reading of the novel?

The fact that most of the things in the novel are fiction doesn’t change my opinion of the novel. Obviously the names are fake because these are the characters private lives and how they got through Vietnam. There were false parts of the story to make it a little over exaggerated so that you imagine and feel what the characters did at the time. I think most of the story was as true as O’Brien could tell it. “I want you to feel what I felt. I want you to know why story-truth is truer sometimes than happening-truth.”

Answered on 02.06.2017.
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