In the novel The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien's. This novel connected to any short stories, but one of the best short story starts with Ted Lavender, and it is mostly important because, he is the first character to die, so his death characteristically make a change in the story. In mid-April, Alpha Company is searching out and destroying Vietcong tunnel. While one of the other men was down in a tunnel and everyone was waiting to see if he would come back up, Ted Lavender popped some tranquilizers and went off to pee. Just as Lee Strunk re-emerges safely and everyone is laughing and joking with him about returning from the dead, Lavender is shot in the head as he walks back from peeing. Kiowa, who saw it happen, is struck by how quickly
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On the one hand, it's our automatic response to assure him and say that just loving Martha couldn't possibly have caused Lavender's death. On the other hand, this is war, and he's the commanding officer. It's very possible that his distraction over Martha caused Lavender to die. “In any other circumstances it might've ended there. But this was Vietnam, where guys carried guns, and Dave Jensen started to worry”. (59)
We see a situation here that has guilt and blame over a couple of simple things—a stolen jackknife, a broken nose. Simple enough. But, in Vietnam, those kinds of things fester. The presence of guns and the overall tension increase the guilt and blame and make them so much worse. “Later we heard that Strunk died somewhere over Chu Lai, which seemed to relieve Dave Jensen of an enormous weight”. (63)
The first loss of all soldiers was the death of Ted Lavender, a soldier who is shot dead outside Than Khe. O’Brien tells that he hits the ground weighed down by all the things he was carrying. He was more afraid of the enemy than most soldiers, so he was carrying more bullets than was required. He had gone to pee while his friends were blowing up a tunnel. Kiowa becomes obsessed by the death of his
On the one hand, it's our automatic response to assure him and say that just loving Martha couldn't possibly have caused Lavender's death. On the other hand, this is war, and he's the commanding officer. It's very possible that his distraction over Martha caused Lavender to die. “In any other circumstances it might've ended there. But this was Vietnam, where guys carried guns, and Dave Jensen started to worry”. (59)
We see a situation here that has guilt and blame over a couple of simple things—a stolen jackknife, a broken nose. Simple enough. But, in Vietnam, those kinds of things fester. The presence of guns and the overall tension increase the guilt and blame and make them so much worse. “Later we heard that Strunk died somewhere over Chu Lai, which seemed to relieve Dave Jensen of an enormous weight”. (63)
The first loss of all soldiers was the death of Ted Lavender, a soldier who is shot dead outside Than Khe. O’Brien tells that he hits the ground weighed down by all the things he was carrying. He was more afraid of the enemy than most soldiers, so he was carrying more bullets than was required. He had gone to pee while his friends were blowing up a tunnel. Kiowa becomes obsessed by the death of his