Truth, Lies, and Literature

In my opinion, "The Things They Carried" most nearly describes the title of our English course. Reading page after page, I can't help having a hunch that this book is more of a memoir than a fictional piece, because frankly O'Brien uses such tremendous detail of combat, death, life in the line of combat, family, etc., that he couldn't possibly make this stuff up. I find it difficult when reading this book to draw a line between fact and fiction, because I can practically close my eyes and picture a scene that O'Brien has written about. That's how much detail he uses. The man is clearly a literary genius, and must absolutely stump pretty much anyone who reads this novel.

A few years back I read another Vietnam War book titled "A Rumor of War" by Philip Caputo, and have seen uncanny resemblances between the two throughout the entire time. Of course, Caputo's book was an autobiography detailing his own experiences, which eerily enough echo the story of the soldiers throughout the current novel we are reading. On the whole I do not analyze and nitpick books to this extent but O'Brien has left me, as stated before, stumped.