“The Man I Killed” Critical Analysis Tim O’Brien’s book, “The Things They Carried”, recollects stories of O’Brien’s times in the war zone. From stories such as “The Things They Carried”, “Love”, “Ambush”, and even “The Man I Killed”, O’Brien gave readers a in-depth look into what it was like to be a soldier in Vietnam. In Tim O’Brien’s “The Man I Killed”, O’Brien describes personal war zone experiences and brings light to the characterization of his subordinates, Kiowa and Azar. “The Man I Killed” is one of the short stories told from Tim O’Brien’s point of view. In this particular short story, O’Brien describes the physical and imaginable attributes of the soldier that was killed by his grenade. He starts out by describing what the
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Even though the soldier that was killed was not one of their own, armed force members are encouraged to show respect to the deceased on both sides. However, in this short story, Azar was characterized as a very insensitive person through his perception of the death. His heartless personality was made clear when he began to compare the deceased to rice krispies and continued to go on and say “Oh, man, you f***in' trashed the f***er," Azar said. "You scrambled his sorry self, look at that, you did, you laid him out like Shredded f***in' Wheat" (87). This dialogue from Azar shows how he stays neutral and thoughtless to the situation. Azar’s character shows how war can make a person lose empathy for fellow human beings. After going through many traumatizing things, one begins to feel nothing and turns very …show more content…
Kiowa did what most soldiers should and would do-- be respectful of one who is deceased. Kiowa was continually reassuring Tim that what happened, happened and that he did what he had to do. "Just forget that crud," he said. He opened up his canteen and held it out for a while and then sighed and pulled it away. "No sweat, man. What else could you do?" (87). Kiowa was trying his hardest to rationalize with Tim in a very straightforward way, but nowhere near as cold-hearted as Azar was. Unlike soldiers that would compare to Azar, Kiowa’s character shows another way of instilling compassion during a time of strife. War makes many people stronger and want to build others up. Like Azar’s character, Kiowa has been through some traumatizing things, but instead of being insensitive or being sensitive he is just strong. This shows the contrast of the effect of war on an
Even though the soldier that was killed was not one of their own, armed force members are encouraged to show respect to the deceased on both sides. However, in this short story, Azar was characterized as a very insensitive person through his perception of the death. His heartless personality was made clear when he began to compare the deceased to rice krispies and continued to go on and say “Oh, man, you f***in' trashed the f***er," Azar said. "You scrambled his sorry self, look at that, you did, you laid him out like Shredded f***in' Wheat" (87). This dialogue from Azar shows how he stays neutral and thoughtless to the situation. Azar’s character shows how war can make a person lose empathy for fellow human beings. After going through many traumatizing things, one begins to feel nothing and turns very …show more content…
Kiowa did what most soldiers should and would do-- be respectful of one who is deceased. Kiowa was continually reassuring Tim that what happened, happened and that he did what he had to do. "Just forget that crud," he said. He opened up his canteen and held it out for a while and then sighed and pulled it away. "No sweat, man. What else could you do?" (87). Kiowa was trying his hardest to rationalize with Tim in a very straightforward way, but nowhere near as cold-hearted as Azar was. Unlike soldiers that would compare to Azar, Kiowa’s character shows another way of instilling compassion during a time of strife. War makes many people stronger and want to build others up. Like Azar’s character, Kiowa has been through some traumatizing things, but instead of being insensitive or being sensitive he is just strong. This shows the contrast of the effect of war on an