Average Analysis of Rhetoric on "The Things We Carried"

481 Words2 Pages
In his narrative “The Things They Carried”, O’Brien demonstrate the differences between each soldier in the Vietnam War. O’Brien’s purpose is to demonstrate to the audience the comparison between the soldiers’ life in and out of the battlefield. Through the use of repetition and pathos, he determines the duality of the soldiers while showing their duties in the war. O’Brien opens his essay by using repetition to describe the purpose of the objects the soldiers carried throughout the war. Every soldier carried the necessities which included can openers and pocket knives. Also, they carried large compressed bandages for easy access because the soldiers can die from wounds so quickly. These objects made them mundane soldiers in the war. They did not only carry objects that made them soldiers, but they carried things that created their identity outside the war. O’Brien begins to presents these items when he says, “First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried letters from a girl named Martha.” In this instance, he formulates that Lieutenant Jimmy Cross loves having romantic trips with Martha and his plans will involve Martha if he was not present in the war because he loves her. Again, O’Brien uses repetition with the word “carried” to emphasize how significant the items are to their daily life. This demonstrates to the audience what the objects they carry represent and how the lives of the soldiers are different within and outside the war. O’Brien shifts his essay by using pathos to portray the humanity of the soldiers in the war. O’Brien begins to present feelings of sympathy when O’Brien dubs the soldiers with, “They were called legs or grunts.” O’Brien signifies that the soldiers' value in the war is to move objects which removes the humanity away from the soldiers. He creates sympathy when he isolates grunts because it displays how the soldiers are struggling to travel

More about Average Analysis of Rhetoric on "The Things We Carried"

Open Document