The Things They Carried Rhetorical Analysis
Writing Prompt 1 In the book “The Things They Carried” the author shows how the soldiers use materialistic objects to work in the harsh environment while also carrying burdens because of death, isolation and shock. The author uses different levels of ambiguity when using the word carried. In the book the word carries spans from physically carrying objects to mentally carrying burdens. Also the character of the soldiers that are introduced in the first chapter are unraveled throughout the book as the readers progress through the novel whether it be how they act in a situation or in general. In the book “The Things They Carried” the author addresses a topic by using one of the ambiguous definitions for carry which was significantly present
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It could be inferred that the soldiers carried the memories of all of there fallen comrades, or it can be that the soldiers referred to the Vietnamese soldiers as ghosts because of their guerrilla war tactics. Another possible option that the ghosts could have been was those people of their hometowns pushing them into joining the war and make it so the young soldiers basically have to die or not show their face anymore. Thats what happened with a lot of soldiers they felt that if they did not fight and die in the war they were cowards and bring shame to their families and themselves. Not only would they feel this but intense guilt because when they were still recruits they knew that people have been fighting and dying for their country. There was one uniformity between all the soldiers and that was in the weapons they carried. On page 5 it lists all of them from the grenades to the sub-machine guns. I think the author included this in the passage because he wanted to establish a sense of uniformity among the soldiers different likings. None of these soldiers wanted to be in the war. This could be inferred because they brought along things to distract them from the fact that they were indeed in the war. So by them being forced to take the weapons, the weapons could be a figurative isolation from the soldiers isolation for the outside
It could be inferred that the soldiers carried the memories of all of there fallen comrades, or it can be that the soldiers referred to the Vietnamese soldiers as ghosts because of their guerrilla war tactics. Another possible option that the ghosts could have been was those people of their hometowns pushing them into joining the war and make it so the young soldiers basically have to die or not show their face anymore. Thats what happened with a lot of soldiers they felt that if they did not fight and die in the war they were cowards and bring shame to their families and themselves. Not only would they feel this but intense guilt because when they were still recruits they knew that people have been fighting and dying for their country. There was one uniformity between all the soldiers and that was in the weapons they carried. On page 5 it lists all of them from the grenades to the sub-machine guns. I think the author included this in the passage because he wanted to establish a sense of uniformity among the soldiers different likings. None of these soldiers wanted to be in the war. This could be inferred because they brought along things to distract them from the fact that they were indeed in the war. So by them being forced to take the weapons, the weapons could be a figurative isolation from the soldiers isolation for the outside