Preview

Where Have You Gone Charming Billy Analysis

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
454 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Where Have You Gone Charming Billy Analysis
True War Story What Tim O’Brien is trying to tell the readers is that true stories, such as war stories, can make the reader feel emotion when reading, or listening about a soldier’s experience. In one of his stories “Where have you gone, Charming Billy”, he tells about a scared young man during his time in the war. He tells the readers that fear can make someone act faster before they can even think about knowing what they are doing. He also tells the readers that a war is filled with fear from soldiers with very little bravery. What Tim O’Brien is telling readers about is how true stories about war can make people feel more emotion. Some stories are full of emotion that touches a reader’s mind when they imagine the feeling of a character. …show more content…
He told the people that fear can make someone act before they can even think about knowing what they are doing. One of those experiences was when he spotted a young man in the cloudy mist walking towards him, with fear, he acted fast without thinking if the man was an enemy. Before he knew it, he had already killed the man when he threw a grenade towards him. Accidents can happen during a soldier’s time in the war. What Tim O’Brien is trying to make the listeners to understand about war is that many soldiers are terrified. There is always a few that are putting a lot of effort into trying to survive. Most of the soldiers that are afraid are the new recruits who are new to the battlefield. Very few men survive a war which means if there was another war, they would be less afraid due to that they know what they are doing. Overall, every single soldier is brave enough to risk their lives to serve, as well as help their country. Tim O’Brien was a brave man during his time in the Vietnam War. He had fear when fighting, but he was also brave for what he has done for his country. His stories about war can make readers feel the same emotions that soldiers have when in battle. He tells readers of how it feels like to be in a war full of

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Tim O’Brien was drafted for multiple reasons. Many people did not like the idea of this war, which made it difficult to find people willing to volunteer. The draft was brought back up so the United…

    • 310 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the book, If I Die in a Combat Zone…, Tim O’Brien, a Vietnam veteran, gives us his raw, personal story on what it was like to be a soldier in a controversial war. O’Brien was/is a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War and yet he completed his one-year service. He does not shy away from his negative opinions about the war and how in a way the government had let him down. O’Brien leads his story from the beginning in 1968 where he is drafted in Minnesota through 1969 with his homecoming. Throughout the book he is keen on the recognition of his comrades’ deaths, the Vietnamese residents, his daily internal/external battles, and the contemplation of what is bravery/courage.…

    • 178 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Tim O’ Brien: he is one of the main characters in the story and what he does is that he collects stories from individuals that had went to fight in the Vietnam War. He is a pacifist meaning he is against war and overall violence. He cares for his family and country more than himself. He was also part of the Vietnam War as a soldier in the Alpha Company and after the war, he decided to collect stories that would help him deal with his pain and the deaths of his companions. Also, he was the narrator in the story.…

    • 426 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Literature is a reflection of the truth. The Things They carried portrayed the Vietnam war accurately. O'Brien took us deep into the emotions of the veterans and it made the readers sympathize with them. O'Brien wrote about the raw emotions of the veterans and that made readers truly sympathize for the veterans. Veterans go through an unexplainable experience that average civilians can never understand. That makes it hard for veterans to talk about their experiences to an extent that someone will understand what they went through. So, in order for Tim O'Brien to get his readers to comprehend his experiences, he writes it in a form of fiction so that he can alter his stories to an extent that his readers can really feel what he felt. Tim O'Brien…

    • 372 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    O'Brien, on pages 80 and 8, talks about how people don't understand the full meaning of the truth behind a war story. There are so many things that go into a war that people and readers don’t understand,which is why he tries to explain why the “truth” and analyzing the meaning is so important. All of the things O’Brien describes in his stories aren't “true” per say because those are not what the story is about. In the end he tries to convey the fact that all are about prejudice. The stories are in fact about cheery subjects like: love, memory, happiness, old times, and no reader will ever understand because they themselves misunderstand. In “Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong” Rat Kiley goes on about the story of Mary Ann. Rat Kiley warns his…

    • 185 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Another interesting, yet powerful way O’Brien shows the non-reality of war’s truths is the fact that a combat situation can reveal who someone is, right down to their core. For example, Dave Jensen is a…

    • 559 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Although O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried” is considered fiction in many ways it is Metafiction. "Metafiction is a term given to fictional writing which self-consciously and systematically draws attention to its status as an artifact in order to pose questions about the relationship between fiction and reality” (Waugh 2.) Once in an interview O’Brien admitted to his conscious blurring of fact and fiction by way of using Metafiction to generate stories that are “more real” (Sawyer 117-126.) O’Brien’s practice of using Metafiction indisputably makes the events and stories conceivable for the reader. The reality of O’Brien’s description of the intangible items each man carried has been noted to have long-term implications for those who have had to lug around the psychological affects of war. According to an article in BMC Psychiatry, “Combat exposure is the factor most consistently associated with mental disorders and symptomatology. Research with Vietnam veterans demonstrated substantial associations between combat exposure and PTSD” (Kewley 1). In another article findings that suggest, “...Vietnam veterans are much more likely to report problems associated with posttraumatic stress disorder including ‘‘nightmares, loss of control of behavior, emotional numbing, withdrawal from the external environment, hyper alertness, anxiety, and depression”(Card 7). The way in which Tim O’Brien represents each character with both the physical and emotional baggage that he carries lends itself to constructing characters that become personal. The characters by way of these items that they carry have become believable. It is because of this believability that the reader can visualize the weight of each character. O’Brien’s ability to blur the lines between fiction and fact with the items carried in war ensures…

    • 1209 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Better Essays

    Tim O’Brien constructs a meticulous narrative in order to portray a true representation of war through his writing. It is well known however that truth always becomes a casualty through war resulting in a challenging approach for O’Brien. Although deemed a work of fiction, many of the stories within The Things They Carried reflect an almost autobiographical outlook through the characters combined with metafiction. O’Brien does well to create a distinction between the truth of the narrative and that of the truth of the events taking place. Therefore it is this conciliation of truth that he uses to recreate his discourse of Vietnam using fictional form combined with a clear exhibition of facts and figures such as in “The Things They Carried” (O’Brien, 3-21). Nevertheless O’Brien still faces an infinite obstacle in regards to trauma. Herman states that ‘The conflict between the will to deny horrible events and the will to proclaim them aloud is the central dialectic of psychological trauma.’ (Herman, 2) In effect the survivors of such ordeals retell their stories in a heavily distorted account due to emotional stress often controverting…

    • 1894 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Tim O’Brien uses several rhetorical strategies in this story. A strategy that is easily found in the story is imagery. He uses a lot of sensory details to help the reader know what it feels like in a certain situation. “Except for the laughter things were quiet,” (67) and “You hear stuff nobody should ever hear,” (69) are some quotes that describes the sounds the soldiers are hearing. O’Brien uses sight as a big component for setting up the setting and describing what the soldiers saw. “A handsome kid, really. Sharp grey eyes, lean and narrow-waisted…”(67), “A deep pinkish red spilled out on the river, which moved with no sound…(68). Another rhetorical strategy that O’Brien uses is motif. The motif that he uses is “…true war story…” He uses this phrase throughout the story to help the reader understand how to write a story. “A true war story is never moral.”(65). This quote is basically saying that a true war story tells it how it is; it doesn’t try to make things easier for the reader to digest. “You can tell a true war story if it embarrasses you.”(65) This quote is saying if you don’t want the offensive words or phrases then you don’t want the truth of the story. “In many cases a true war story cannot be believed.”(68) The last strategy that O’Brien uses in this story is irony. There are many places in this story when O’Brien’s ideas contradict themselves. When Curt Lemon dies, O’Brien describes it as beautiful. “…when he died it was almost beautiful, the way the sunlight came around him and lifted him up…”…

    • 917 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    “War is hell, but that’s not the half of it, because war is also mystery and terror and adventure and courage and discovery and holiness and pity and despair and longing and love. War is nasty; war is fun. War is thrilling; war is drudgery. War makes you a man; war makes you dead” (76). According to Tim O’Brien, all of these generalizations about war are the truth. However, as O’Brien continuously reshapes readers’ concept of truth throughout The Things They Carried, one quickly comes to realize that none of these facts represent truth about war. Readers experience the essence of Vietnam through each of O’Brien and his squadron’s vivid memories: Rat Kiley’s loss of a friend as Curt Lemon stepped into his last ray of sunlight and was blown up into the trees, Norman Bowker resigning to letting Kiowa slip under the mud and out of this life, and the “dainty young man” with his jaw in his throat and his eye as a star-shaped hole that was O’Brien’s only kill. Though portrayed as true life experiences, these events and even most of these characters are eventually revealed as fabrications of O’Brien’s mind. Does this mean that the stories are not true? As explained in another passage, “You can tell a true war story by the questions you ask. Somebody tells a story, let’s say, and afterward you ask, ‘Is it true?’ and if the answer matters, you’ve got your answer” (79). So, does it matter that O’Brien never really killed a man, that Bowker never sacrificed the Silver Star medal, and that Curt Lemon never trick-or-treated through a Vietnamese village during Halloween? After the undeniable impact on readers associated with the human experience, war experience, and essence of individuals captured within these stories, the answer to that question proves to be a resounding “no.”…

    • 1624 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    The main subject of this book is the horrors of war. Tim O’Brien fought in the Vietnam War and has experienced some of the events he retells in the book. For example, in “The Man I Killed,” a chapter in the book, O’Brien describes the man he killed over and over again because the horror that he killed someone was imprinted on his mind. His friend, Kiowa tells him to “come on, stop staring” (p. 120). But O’Brien can’t stop staring at the deceased man because he continues to describe every detail about him over and over again. I have a family friend who is in the military and when he was in Afghanistan 2 years ago, he had to kill someone on his birthday. He was horrified by what he had done and he still is horrified to this very day. O’Brien is demonstrating the same horror that he felt when he killed someone by repeating details and he doesn’t know what to do but just think about what this man’s life could have been like. Furthermore, in “Speaking of Courage,” O’Brien tells an anecdote about Norman Bowker’s life after the war through the eyes of Norman Bowker. Norman Bowker wants to “[explain] how his friend Kiowa slipped away... beneath the dark swampy field” and how it was him who “let the guy go” (p. 147). O’Brien writes in “Notes” that Norman Bowker hung himself 3 years after O’Brien wrote “Speaking of Courage.” Norman had no way of dealing with the horrors he experienced in the war and it wasn’t easy for him to re-enter into a society that had no idea what he had been through. This is similar to the old guy that hung himself in the movie “The Shawshank Redemption.” The old guy was cleared to re-enter society and he couldn’t take it because he was so used to living in prison. In fact, he spent most of his life in prison. Well, this is similar…

    • 1728 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The reason why O'Brien wrote the war stories was that it all started when his young daughter Kathleen asked if he had ever killed anyone to which he replied no- which was a lie. O'Brien began writing the stories while pretending his daughter was an adult to help explain what happened during the war and to also explain the night he killed someone. The war stories are meaningful to O'Brien because it was a big part of his life that changed him as a human being especially after he ended a person's life mistakenly. I feel as though O'Brien wants to share these stories with the readers to show the raw unedited side of the war from a soldiers perspective. The war stories are a way to present the horrors, sadness, friendship, and loss that occurred…

    • 146 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    How to Tell a True War Story

    • 2535 Words
    • 11 Pages

    O’Brien tells his story when he was in the Vietnam War though books that he has written. For example in “The Things They Carried” there is a character named Tim. One of the interviews from Library of Congress Tim O’Brien states that “he goes back and forth about Vietnam and also about his first girlfriend.” He was in 4th grade when he was in love and that using his girlfriend as an example that Vietnam was not that easy like losing his girlfriend at nine years old. In the story Bob Kiley was known as Rat. O’ Brien points out that Rat that had a good friend with him in the Vietnam War. They both were good soldiers and when Lemon would volunteer Rat would volunteer as well. He lets people know that his friend and he were goofing around like always. Lemon showed Rat that the war can be fun but also very serious. There will be times to goof around and there will be times to be services during the war. He tells people that when they were goofing around they felt like kids again. Lemon and Rat “were giggling and calling each other motherfucker”. They would go a nature hike in the woods and started messing around. They heard a noise and next thing a bomb killed his friend. Rat had taken his friend back with the other soldiers. Hs friend named was Curt Lemon. He told Sander and the other soldiers what happen to Lemon.…

    • 2535 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Tim O’Brien recoils when he receives his draft notice in the mail. He is shocked and believes that he is too smart and young to go to war. Before the war he would spend many nights driving around, thinking: “about the war and the pig factory and how my life seemed to be collapsing toward slaughter. I felt paralyzed. All around me the options seemed to be narrowing, as if I were hurtling down a huge black funnel, the whole world squeezing in tight” (O 'Brien 41). This is a very difficult time in Tim’s life and he begins questioning everything. He almost flees to Canada and leaves his family, friends, and home to escape the draft. This shows how someone is willing to change his life so that he…

    • 2525 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “How to Tell a True War Story” is a love story (among others), Tim O’Brien describes the relationships he held throughout the war, this story describes love for a girl and it describes love for the friends he had made in the worst times he ever experienced. The love they experience with one another is that of respect and time. Love is shown in the form of sacrifice for the happiness of others. Love in this story is when a soldier puts…

    • 559 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays