Source Evaluation

Tina Chen. '"Unraveling the Deeper Meaning": Exile and the Embodied Poetics of Displacement in Tim O'Brien's  The Things They Carried.' Contemporary Literature Spring 1998, Vol. 39 No. 1: Pages 77-98. University of Wisconsin Press.

Tina Chen talks about how Tim O'Brien isn't just telling stories about war. How the The Things They Carried has several short stories all with underlying meanings and metonymic symbolism, an example includes how Vietnam is alive, as a country. Tina goes on to declare that Tim feels displaced no matter what he chooses, and how Vietnam was as much a home to him as Minnesota was before the war. Talking about the dead as though they are still alive, helps him cope with the realities he has to face. As Tim is writing these truths that are not true, telling stories to get stuff of his chest so he can live again, Tina realizes there is a them of exile in his stories. All the death, all the decisions he faces alone, fighting a war that was never his own, she cites the meaning of displacement from other sources, and says Tim has wrote about displacement and exile.

This article will help me in my essay, show how Vietnam was a hardship on soldiers. She uses multiple resources, I can pull from, to back up her arguments. The fact that she covers almost all the stories and dissects each one of them, will help me choose from several of Tim's writings. The article is long and analyzes other aspects as she makes her points, and I can pull several things like displacement and coping mechanisms of soldiers from this article.

Chen's Bio

My Cover Letter

Dear Mrs. Cline,

This has been a challenging first half of the semester. I still love to read, but dissecting and critiquing poems, and short stories is not my forte. One of the biggest things that have helped me, is when you said we aren't trying to guess the authors purpose. It's as if we are analyzing ourselves through these writers words. Looking at it this way helps me, where I usually am gun shy. Now, I can just pull the trigger and let my thoughts flow. The readings have not had a huge affect on me. I've seen all sorts of war movies, some they say are more accurate then others. I've enjoyed the realism, and the first hand experience of the writers. My admiration goes out to them; they are true warriors.

The second half of the class, I hope to keep on myself. The plan is to write as much as possible. I believe this is my weakness. Keeping a thesaurus near by (something I learned from ENG101) to hopefully make my writing more fluent and enjoyable. Who knows I might work a little on my blog. I can throw some designs on there, giving it a personal touch. By the end of the semester I want to be able to write freely, not just on any topic, but in various forms. I would like to write essays, stories, and anything else that comes to mind.

Thank You
Jacob Durant

Summary Vs. Analysis

"Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong,"

Summary

“Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong” is about a soldier's girlfriend getting shipped to him in Vietnam. It is told from the perspective of Rat Kiley who happened to be in this guys squad at the time. The squad starts off talking, killing time, about how they should set up a little brothel right there in camp. Since there is no high ranking officers around they could get away with it pretty easy. One man takes the conversation to heart. Mark Fossie decides to buy his girlfriend, Mary Anne, plane tickets so she could come visit him during the war. The whole squad thinks he's nuts and it won't happen, but sure enough a couple weeks later his pretty girlfriend shows up to camp.

Everyone takes a liking to her right away. She is fun loving, happy, flirtatious, and genuinely easy to get along with. On top of all this she takes an interest in the military way of life and in Vietnam. She stops worrying about hygiene as much, and wants Mark to take her into the local village. Mark starts to get a little worried and tries to slow her down telling her how dangerous it is in Vietnam. Soon though she starts coming back to the barracks late and one night she doesn't even show up. Mark finds out she was going on “hunts” with the local Green Berets. She is now an altogether different person. Her once bright blue compassionate eyes have now taken on the color of the jungle, harsh and adventurous. Mary was once infatuated with Mark possibly in love with him, and now her thrill is the jungle that's all she can think about. The thrill of firefights and silence of shadows is what she looks for, not boys.

The story ends with Mark being miserable over the loss of his love, both in the fact that she left him and she is a changed woman. Rat tells how he might even love her more now then when she first stepped foot into camp. Mary representing to him, what the jungle can do to a person. The Green Berets are even amazed at the chances she begins to take. She doesn't take her rifle and half her gear most of the time they go on hunts now. The last anyone sees of her is walking off into the mountains by herself. No trace of her is ever found.

Analysis

War get's to everyone, know matter who you are. Here is this naive, cheerleader, happy go lucky girl, that comes to a war zone. She then turns into a cold blooded killer. You see the change very rapidly from a girl that is in love with her boyfriend, “Almost disgusting, Rat said, the way the mooned over each other.” (O'Brien 90), to a predator of the jungle. No matter how innocent a person is they will go through something so horrific and some people say beautiful experience, that they will be a changed individual forever. It's inconsequential whether it be for the good or for the bad, everyone is different. Mark Fossie might never be able to recoup after what he experienced, losing the love of his life. O'brien tells time and again how sickly Mark becomes, “His voiced seemed hollow and stuffed-up, nasal sounding ...” (O'Brien 95). Then again it might be for the good. Mary found an inner peace out in the jungle. She knows exactly who she is (O'Brien 106). War changes everyone. This man could of been your local fire fighter, ain't war hell (Full Metal Jacket). Tim O'Brien was trying to show us that war changes and us that have never been there will never know how much.

Tim O'Brien. “Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong”. Short story in “The Things They Carried”. Houghton    Mifflin, 1990. First Mariner Books Edition, 2009.

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