In Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle,
and O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, there exist a significant amount of
lies, whether it be in the form of a foma, or an exaggerated or fabricated
story. Both books present a base depressing
and cynical perspective on the world, intermixed by a fabric of mistruth. However, it is through these mistruths that
the characters understand and mold the worlds they live in, and subsequently how
the reader does as well.
The Things They Carried speaks a
lot concerning the nature of stories, specifically in the chapter “Good
Form”. This is also where the “anvil” of
the fact that these stories are made up is dropped. In contrast, Cat’s Cradle admits from the
very start.
Why would
someone knowingly deceive themselves and their readers? O’Brien argues that,
“What stories can do, I guess, is make things present.” (172) O’Brien wants to relate the experience
of war, loss, and other sentiments to the reader in a natural way. For him, this is simply by the act of
storytelling. In a construct he
specifically designs, he can “look at things he never looked at…attach faces to
grief and love and pity and God…be brave…make myself feel again.” (172) Thus,
this is how his characters interact with the world he creates them in. In this world he makes, easily confusable
with the real one, he can use metaphors and attention to detail to come across these
emotions he feels he needs to communicate.
Similarly, Cat’s Cradle relies on admitting its falsehoods to better
emphasize the ideas that are prevalent in the narrative, and not a “happening-truth”.
I think it's really interesting that you consider O'brien's self deception to be a willing one. I wonder what impact this has on the idea that he's trying to revive the dead. Although O'Brien says that through his war stories he's bringing the dead back to life, perhaps he's really just reviving choice perceptions of his dead loved ones and, while each one is flawed, perhaps they are flawed in a way he choses, meaning that he only keeps a chosen version of them alive.
ReplyDeleteRich I agree with you that both books used lies and mistrust to build the framework for their characters and readers to live in. It seems that everyone reading these books are just absorbing the lies that are given to them even though they are told that they are being lied too. I think O’Brien and Vonnegut need these lies to express their emotions and feelings to the readers. These authors also use the characters to create a world that is more believable and that has more impact on the readers, while reading.
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