A Farewell To Arms Literary Analysis
Victor Estrada
Mr. Polanco
4AP Literature and Composition
August 25 2015
Outlasting War War has existed since the dawn of time and, since the beginning, has impacted humanity in various ways. While wars do mold and transform nations, more importantly, wars have had and will have a great impact on soldiers, those willing to sacrifice their lives for their country. The novels A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway and The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien give us a glimpse into how war has impacted soldiers and those close to them. The novel A Farewell to Arms talks of a man who falls in love with a woman he works with, a nurse in the hospital, Catherine Barkley. The narrator, Frederic Henry, meets the nurse while he is working in the army. …show more content…
O’Brien mentions in The Things They Carried that he writes because he cannot forget, even though he has already transitioned from a time of war into a time of peace. Regarding the death of his fellow comrade, Kiowa, he states: “It was hard stuff to write. Kiowa, after all, had been a close friend, and for years I’ve avoided thinking about his death and my own complicity in it”. Here he exemplifies how the war has impacted him, how it has made him repress his memories, throughout the course of many years, of those close to him that he has lost as a result of the war. Ironically, however, he also wrote: “I did not look on my work as therapy, and still don’t. Yet when I received Norman Bowker’s letter, it occurred to me that the act of writing had led me through a swirl of memories that might otherwise have ended in paralysis or worse”. Thus, the mere act of writing down his stories, while they are hard to endure, helps him to keep himself from deteriorating, whether mentally, physically, or both, and helps him to endure the war’s after
Mr. Polanco
4AP Literature and Composition
August 25 2015
Outlasting War War has existed since the dawn of time and, since the beginning, has impacted humanity in various ways. While wars do mold and transform nations, more importantly, wars have had and will have a great impact on soldiers, those willing to sacrifice their lives for their country. The novels A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway and The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien give us a glimpse into how war has impacted soldiers and those close to them. The novel A Farewell to Arms talks of a man who falls in love with a woman he works with, a nurse in the hospital, Catherine Barkley. The narrator, Frederic Henry, meets the nurse while he is working in the army. …show more content…
O’Brien mentions in The Things They Carried that he writes because he cannot forget, even though he has already transitioned from a time of war into a time of peace. Regarding the death of his fellow comrade, Kiowa, he states: “It was hard stuff to write. Kiowa, after all, had been a close friend, and for years I’ve avoided thinking about his death and my own complicity in it”. Here he exemplifies how the war has impacted him, how it has made him repress his memories, throughout the course of many years, of those close to him that he has lost as a result of the war. Ironically, however, he also wrote: “I did not look on my work as therapy, and still don’t. Yet when I received Norman Bowker’s letter, it occurred to me that the act of writing had led me through a swirl of memories that might otherwise have ended in paralysis or worse”. Thus, the mere act of writing down his stories, while they are hard to endure, helps him to keep himself from deteriorating, whether mentally, physically, or both, and helps him to endure the war’s after