On The Rainy River

561 Words3 Pages
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien has many chapters throughout it which exemplify the Vietnam experience. Certain chapters in the book though including How to Tell a True War Story, and On the Rainy River exemplify many different parts of the Vietnam experience. How to Tell a True War Story is one of the most symbolic chapters in the entire book. The chapter talks about how Curt Lemon was killed while playing catch with Rat Kiley one afternoon when he stepped on a 105 round. As the chapter continues we hear a story from Mitchell Sanders about the six men who went on a mission and who heard sounds through the fog and rocks. The chapter shows how many soldiers who were involved in this war had lost their insanity. O’Brien also explains…show more content…
As O’Brien struggles to run away from his problems he finds that he only has one reason not to, and that reason is shame. Many men at the time of the Vietnam War did not want to go and tried everything possible in their power to not half to just like O’Brien. Some fled to Canada and burned their draft cards, while others just went to just get it over with, but many of them did not want to be there in the first place. These men did not want to die in Vietnam. Some like O’Brien had just finished college and were starting their careers, but in an instant it was all taken away from them. In O’Brien’s case he chose to flee to Canada just like others but when he was given a choice he chose to go to war not because he wanted to, but because he could picture people in his town talking about him, or saying how he was an embarrassment to his country for not going to fight in the war. The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien has many messages in it throughout the novel which all can exemplify the Vietnam experience. The men at this time did not have the choice to enlist like we do as citizens today. They were forced to go whether they wanted to or not, and if they didn’t they could have been arrested and thrown in jail. Also the novel shows how the men who fought in this war saw so many things that they will never forget because they are not able
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