Monday, February 17, 2014
How Important is the Truth?
In the first 136 pages of the novel The Things They Carried, author Tim O'Brien clearly blurs the lines between fiction and fact. O'Brien dedicates the book to "the men of Alpha Company...to Jimmy Cross, Norman Bowker, Rat Kiley, Mitchell Sanders, Henry Dobbins, and Kiowa," names the characters of his book after these men, and even shares the same name as the narrator. In this way, the reader must distinguish what is fact and what is fiction. But how can they accomplish this task? It seems impossible for the audience to do so, as it is unclear whether any of the stories O'Brien tells actually occurred. In addition, in response to the title, I liked O'Brien's double meaning
on the word "things." He explains in great detail the physical objects
that men carried: "Jimmy Cross carried a compass, maps, code books,
binoculars..."(5). However, Cross carries emotional baggage as well. He
probably carries with him an incredible amount of stress and responsibility
for the lives of his men, and maybe, deep down, fear of failing them. He
also carries the intense guilt of Ted Lavender's death. Perhaps O'Brien believes that what's important is not the cold, hard facts, but rather how the reader feels when reading his stories; their emotional reaction matters more because to O'Brien and to the reader, that emotional response is what is true.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
How important really is this distinction between "fact" and "fiction"? I think what Tim O'Brien is trying to tell us is that a true war story has nothing to do with the second by second verbal account of what "factually" occurred. This becomes more apparent in the chapter "How to tell a true war story" when he says it is "difficult to separate what happened and what seemed to happen. What seems to happen becomes its own happening and has to be told that way"(67). What really matters in a true war story is what is true to the person who experienced it; what seems to happen and what they felt. As we see in the epigraph, "those who have had any such experience as the author will see its truthfulness at once". This epigraph tells us that Tim O'Brien's definition of truth has just about nothing to do with seeing but everything to do with the perspective of those who experienced it.
ReplyDeleteI agree, and I think that the truthfulness of the war story to the reader totally depends on the ability of the author to puppeteer us into feeling the emotions that he felt. This is why O'Brien calls war stories "love stories." He has succeeded in giving us the truth when he can manipulate us into feeling the love, pain, and sadness that he did during his time in war.
ReplyDelete