The Things They Carried (Tim O'Brien)

The Pains They Carried

War, despite its tragic and destructive nature, is a topic that repeatedly crops up in many writers’ works, both of past time and contemporary trend. It might be that the very cruelty and ruthlessness of a war, something that creates an unforgettable experience for all of its hapless victims, are what make wartime a popular setting for many literary pieces. As the late 1960s saw the United States engulfed in one of the most bitter and lingering conflict in the course of history, the Vietnam War, volumes of texts have been written on the subject to address the issue at hand. It is the sense of the horrid reality at the battle front in these stories that render them valuable narratives for all readers. Above all, when it comes to this so-called “ten-thousand-day conflict”, perhaps few writers can do better than what Tim O’Brien, himself a veteran of the war, did in his masterpiece, “The Things They Carried”, a vivid and moving account of American soldiers struggling within the acrimonious soil of Vietnam. The theme itself is remarkable for the gritty truth it bespeaks: Aside from all the physical things the young soldiers carry on their backs, there are other weights, more intangible and yet no less burdensome, that encumber these men on their painful journey through a war of great dismay and ambiguities, in a land far aloof from their beloved country.

Although “The Things They Carried” was written well over ten years after the war actually ended, mostly based on the author’s reminiscence of that awful period, O’Brien’s brilliant story-telling ability did not lose his work any of the shocking reality. In fact, the inner feelings of each character, be it love, fear, or hope, shades every line of O’Brien’s narration with such astounding genuineness, making the whole story indeed an enamored work of fiction. With illustrative and detailed description, the author proceeds to sketch out the intense list of things carried by each soldier, ranging...