The Things They Carried Quote 21417 A true

The Things They Carried

Quote 2/14/17 "A true war story is never moral. It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior, nor restrain men from doing the things men have always done. If a story seems moral, do not believe it. If at the end of a war story you feel uplifted, or if you feel that some small bit of rectitude has been salvaged from the larger waste, then you have been made the victim of a very old and terrible lie. There is no rectitude whatsoever. There is no virtue. As a first rule of thumb, therefore, you can tell a true war story by its absolute and uncompromising allegiance to obscenity and evil. “

Terminology 2/14/17 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. SOP: Standard Operating Procedure RTO: Radio Technical Officer LP: Long-range patrol LZ: Landing Zone KIA: Killed in Action VC: Vietcong MIA: Missing in Action

Tim O'Brien is from small town Minnesota. He was born in Austin on October 1, 1946, a birth date he shares with several of his characters and grew up in Worthington, "Turkey Capital of the World. “ He matriculated at Macalester College. Graduation in 1968 found him with a BA in political science and a draft notice. O'Brien was against the war, but reported for service and was sent to Vietnam with what has been called the "unlucky" America division due to its involvement in the My Lai massacre in 1968, an event which figures prominently in In the Lake of the Woods. He was assigned to 3 rd Platoon, A Co. , 5 th Batt. 46 th Inf. , as an infantry foot soldier. O'Brien's tour of duty was 1969 -70. After Vietnam he became a graduate student at Harvard. No doubt he was one of very few Vietnam veterans there at that time, much less Combat Infantry Badge (CIB) holders. Having the opportunity to do an internship at the Washington Post, he eventually left Harvard to become a newspaper reporter. O'Brien's career as a reporter gave way to his fiction writing after publication of his memoir If I Die in a Combat Zone, Box Me Up and Send Me Home.

Tim O'Brien is now a visiting professor and endowed chair at Southwest Texas State University where he teaches in the Creative Writing Program.

1. Notebook 2. Novel

The Things I Carry 2/15/17 1. How far did you travel to get here (school)? 2. What do you carry with regularly? What do these items say about you? Tangible: ex; hand sanitizer or asthma inhaler 3. What do you carry with you always that is intangible? ex: guilt, anger, pride, etc.

LOVE AND SPIN 2/15/17 1. What does Love reveal about the novel's point of view? 2. What does the chapter (love) reveal about Jimmy Cross and Tim O'Brien? 3. During moments of great tension, people often use comic relief in attempts to cope and reduce anxiety. What incidents in "Spin" provide comic relief? 4. What is the significance of the description of the checkers games played by Norman Bowker and Henry Dobbins? 5. Are any new characters mentioned? What do we learn about them? 6. What is the significance of Bowker's comments about medals? 7. Mitchell Sanders told a story about an AWOL solider. Does the story have a moral?

TTTC – Chapter 1 1. In the list of all the things the soldiers carried, what item was most surprising? Which item did you find most evocative of the war? 2. In what sense does Jimmy love Martha? Why does he construct this elaborate, mostly fictional, relationship with her: What does he get out of it? 3. Why do the soldiers tell jokes about the war, about killing? 4. How is the idea of weight used and developed in the story? How do you, as a reader, feel reading those lists of weight? What effect does it have on you? 5. How has Jimmy changed by the end of the story? How will he be a different person from this point of on? What has he learned about himself? Or to put it another way, what has he lost and what has he gained?