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.
Kiowa thought his action was impressive and complimenting him of having guts to say no. O’Brien then tells him that the body reminded him of his love in 4th grade with a girl named Linda. He remembered going on a date with her which was planned by his parents to a movie called The Man Who Never Was. He would only compliment Linda on the red cap she would always wear. O’Brien then talks about a soldier named Ted Lavender who died in Vietnam who would take tranquilizers to calm himself and was always asked “How is the war going?” , and would always reply “Mellow”.
This comparison to Jesus Christ himself shows that Jimmy is a very important player in the war as well as in the story. Jimmy carried letters “…from a girl named Martha, a junior at Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey. They were not love letters, but Lieutenant Cross was hoping, so he carried them folded in plastic at the bottom of his rucksack” (251). ”Jimmy carried pictures. Jimmy carried the ghost of years passed and the memory of a love that never truly was.
Love is the Most Powerful Weapon The stories “The Scarlet Ibis” and “The Gift of the Magi “ have similar themes. The theme to “The Scarlet Ibis” is it is never known how much you love someone until that person is gone. The author, James Hurst, showed that the narrator loved his brother by saying: “For a long, long time, it seemed like forever; I lay there crying, sheltering my fallen scarlet ibis from the heresy of the rain.”(Hurst 604). In the story, the narrator got his brother, Doodle, to walk and he took it too far because he started to get Doodle to jog. Because of the narrator taking it to far, Doodle died under a tree in a rainstorm.
Internally, “First Lieutenant Cross carried letters from a girl named Martha, a junior at Mount Sebastian College in New Jersey. They were not love letters, but LT Cross was hoping, so he kept them folded in plastic at the bottom of his rucksack” (P 1). LT Cross had this love for Martha that just consumed all of his time, and left his platoon to lead themselves the majority of the time. To be a LT, you had to have some education and during his studies, this is probably where LT Cross met Martha. “In his wallet, LT Cross carried two photographs of Martha.
The author narrates the short story by starting with a theme about dilemma between responsibility and personal needs. Sometimes many people tend to misjudge which would be their priority whether it is their responsibility or personal needs. This is shown by a character named Lieutenant Jimmy Cross. Cross who is a soldier loves his so called girlfriend, Martha. He used to take and read her letters whenever he is free.
130). By emphasizing the death of this man consistently throughout the chapter, it pin point the agony he felt once he killed basically a man who was not fit for war. Through the constant descriptions of the dead body, it shows the emotional truth behind the feeling of killing a human being and from that readers can understand the anguish of taking the life of another person. These soldiers also had to endure killing people “because they were embarrassed not to” and the men had to sacrifice themselves so “they died so as not to die of embarrassment” (21). In “The Things They Carried” chapter, O’Brien goes in to great detail to tell every little thing each soldier carried and a major thing they carried was the feeling of honor and to die a man.
I touched your left knee and you gave me that sad look so I suddenly took my hand away. Later I kissed you goodnight at your dorm room door. The pebble that you sent me has been my good luck charm; I kept it in my mouth to remind me of you. The two pictures of you bring me back to a place I really want to be but I cannot. I am a leader of men in this war and I have to put their lives above everything else without any other distractions.
Kattie Shull Katherine Minott English 102 August 24, 2012 The Things They Carried The Things They Carried was written by O’Brien and was published in 1986. O’Brien was drafted into the Vietnam War which gives him some knowledge on war and what happens during it. In this short story he wrote about Lieutenant Cross and how he was in love with a women named Martha. He was also the leader of his squad and was always on lookout for the enemy since he was responsible for his men’s lives. Cross is responsible for the death of Lavenders life because he was day dreaming of Martha, not keeping his mind on War and he loved Martha more than he loved his men therefore his only way to keep his mind clear he was to burn the letters that Martha
Berlin always looked forward until the morning so he could adjust the leather binding on his helmet and clean his rifle. He wanted the feeling of being safe and escape the world he lived in and what he fought for. The next literature work, “The Friendship” written by Ms. Adams, speaks of taking someone’s place and becoming the person who is needed by the loved one in the “last few seconds of their life” (Adams, 10). They would call for a loved one and she responded and became them. Even though she never lied to them, she met them and became a friend in their last few seconds.