The Significance of What They Carried Core 11 Summer Assignment
“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength,” (George Orwell, 1984) This quote represents the stages of emotions that the Alpha Company is currently going through throughout the war, when the men return home from the war, they all go through different struggles to get back to the way their life was before. Jimmy Cross carries guilt, for being responsible for the two deaths of his men. Rat Kiley carries the stresses of fighting in the war, and what role he plays in it. Norman Bowker carries depression, feeling as if he will amount to nothing, and that he can do nothing with his life, after the war has ended. These three characters all have one thing in common, they each carry something of great necessity to them, the significance of these items are shown before, during, and after the war. Even though the war is over, the constant struggles and emotions still remain, haunting these characters about what once was. (T)
Jimmy Cross, the …show more content…
Rat Kiley was a nice guy, since he was the medic, he would need to take care of everyone, and make sure they felt better, at least good enough to go back and fight in the war, he carried everything that a normal medic would. We can see the transition that Rat Kiley goes through, at the beginning of the story he seems like a funny, and a cool guy, “Rat Kiley carried comic books.” (Page 2, O’Brien) unphased by the struggles of fighting in the war, and being away from friends and family. However, in “Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong,” we can see that Kiley is just a representation of Tim O’Brien himself, “Among men the men in the Alpha Company, Rat had a reputation for exaggeration and overstatement, a compulsion to rev up the facts..” (Page 85, O’Brien) However Rat Kiley eventually gives into the pressures of the war, and “blows his toe off,” intentionally, so he is forced to leave his
“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength,” (George Orwell, 1984) This quote represents the stages of emotions that the Alpha Company is currently going through throughout the war, when the men return home from the war, they all go through different struggles to get back to the way their life was before. Jimmy Cross carries guilt, for being responsible for the two deaths of his men. Rat Kiley carries the stresses of fighting in the war, and what role he plays in it. Norman Bowker carries depression, feeling as if he will amount to nothing, and that he can do nothing with his life, after the war has ended. These three characters all have one thing in common, they each carry something of great necessity to them, the significance of these items are shown before, during, and after the war. Even though the war is over, the constant struggles and emotions still remain, haunting these characters about what once was. (T)
Jimmy Cross, the …show more content…
Rat Kiley was a nice guy, since he was the medic, he would need to take care of everyone, and make sure they felt better, at least good enough to go back and fight in the war, he carried everything that a normal medic would. We can see the transition that Rat Kiley goes through, at the beginning of the story he seems like a funny, and a cool guy, “Rat Kiley carried comic books.” (Page 2, O’Brien) unphased by the struggles of fighting in the war, and being away from friends and family. However, in “Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong,” we can see that Kiley is just a representation of Tim O’Brien himself, “Among men the men in the Alpha Company, Rat had a reputation for exaggeration and overstatement, a compulsion to rev up the facts..” (Page 85, O’Brien) However Rat Kiley eventually gives into the pressures of the war, and “blows his toe off,” intentionally, so he is forced to leave his