"The Lives of the Dead" and its Significance

Near the end of The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien shifts the focus of the novel away from war stories. “The Lives of The Dead” starts just like most other chapters, set in a small village in Vietnam.  The author describes how he felt awkward and detached while the other members of his platoon shook hands with a dead man, in a strange sort of ritual. He then shifts the focus to the much younger “Timmy” with a lengthy flashback recounting his first true love Linda.

            In this story the reader gets to explore the deepest emotions of O’Brien, similar to when he was considering fleeing to Canada. He explains how he tells stories to keep the dead “alive,” and how story telling is a cathartic procedure. With so many anecdotes and stories from his time in Vietnam, O’Brien is preserving the lives of these men who would otherwise be forgotten. He admits that by writing stories, he is trying to “save Timmy’s life with a story” (233). To me, this admission made the whole purpose of the novel evident. It made sense that he went into such great detail about the man he killed, simply because he wanted to preserve him and his legacy, creating another world in which the young man went on to become a scholar of mathematics.

            Nevertheless, the back of the book clearly states fiction as its genre, and the author himself simply said that he was simply writing fictional stories. This information still confuses me. I think that O’Brien included these deeply emotional segments in his book simply because they are tantalizing and thought provoking, and encourage the reader to question him or herself.

Living the Night Life

"That was the phrase everyone used: the night life. A language trick. It made things seem tolerable" (208).

The previous quote was used to summarize how the men in the platoon felt while in Japan, however it also serves a broader meaning and address an overarching theme in The Things They Carried. O'Brien uses language to engage and inform the readers of the war in Vietnam, because language is essentially the only thing he has left. We see throughout the novel that O'Brien and his platoon mates lose everything in the war. The lose friends, loved ones, limbs, belongings, hope, and innocence. They lose tangibles and intangibles. They lose the ability to forget about the war because it is so engrained into their memory and their being. They lose themselves.

Language is the only instrument O'Brien has left after the war to make things "tolerable." He becomes a writer for this very reason. But O'Brien does not simply use language to describe to us his experience in Vietnam. He admits to us that he is a forty-three year old writer and once was a foot soldier in Quang Ngai Province. He follows his "truth" by confessing to us that "almost everything else is invented." (171). Thus, he reveals to use that The Things They Carried is nothing but a "language trick."As readers, this is appalling because we come to feel so much for and relate to the characters in the novel. We become invested in the story because O'Brien makes us feel that way.

Later on, O'Brien tries to explain to us once again why he wrote The Things They Carried. "The thing about a story is that you dream it as you tell it, hoping that others might then dream along with you, and in this way memory and imagination and language combine to make spirits in the head" (218). We feel "the illusion of aliveness" (218) as we read. First we feel it, then it is ripped away from us, then finally we feel it again. The purpose of O'Brien's writing is to make us feel the things he felt and dream along with him, so that we can understand, or at least try, the things he himself cannot seem to grasp. Maybe, his hopes were that our understanding may better help him understand why he lost so much in Vietnam. Or maybe he knows we are unable to understand, and is simply writing to keep the "spirits," of those who were lost in the war, alive.

The author Tim O’Brien uses his novel The Things They Carried to explore the reality in intangible dreams. The character Tim O’Brien clings to memories and perceptions collected over a lifetime of loss as the only common ground between him and the life his physical self takes. Whether Tim or Timmy, the character can only describe how he felt, not how events actually happened. He equates codified ideas just to the harsh physical life upon which his story is based and thus raises the question: does it matter if something actually happens as long as it could have happened? The stories Tim brings to life, though ultimately false, convinced enough critics to warrant widespread acclaim; the war story that serves as the base for O’Brien’s novel is held as a pinnacle of “what Vietnam was really like,” yet every word was a lie. Such a contradiction would not be out of place in the Bokononist ideology created by Kurt Vonnegut in Cat’s Cradle. The stories Tim tells himself are harmless untruths, which Bokonon advertises as an easy fix for the true horror of life. The lies Tim tells himself are so close to reality because, as he claims, all of his stories could have happened and likely did to others. The character Tim writes his false stories to mask or even release the pain blocking the real ones, a true Bokononist response to seemingly endless despair.

Tricked

            Last class we were told that it was revealed in an interview with Tim O’Brien that 90% or more of the material in The Things They Carried was invented and that 90% or more about the character of Tim O’Brien was made up. I was taken by surprise, and immediately realized that Tim O’Brien had tricked me. Was this his goal? Did he aim to make me believe that the events he spoke about in so much detail, with so much emotion, really happened? Each story vividly portrayed the front-line in Vietnam with sensitivity to both the emotional and physical realities of war. I had known, of course, that this was a work of fiction, but nevertheless, a part of me still believed that these stories were rooted in truth. As I read the book, I would think to myself, “That had to have happened to him” because I felt sincere emotion for the characters.

            Why did Tim O’Brien essentially trick his readers? Why did he write this story in such a careful way that would lead us to believe that these events truly happened to him, and that the character of Tim O’Brien is a representation of himself? The character of Tim O’Brien is no more than a construct of the author. This is seemingly a war story; we are mislead into thinking that this is an actual story about Vietnam, a true account of the war itself. However, this story is simply set in Vietnam, and is nothing more than the author coming to terms with his memories of the war. He is using the power of storytelling to convince his readers that the stories that make up this book are true, when really most of them have come straight from his imagination. This leaves me wondering about Tim O’Brien’s intentions when he was writing this book. Did he use it as a means of coping? Did he seek to finally talk about the traumatic events of the war, even though it was in an indirect way? Did he want to preserve his innocence before the war? I don’t think there is a definite answer. Whatever he aimed to do, O’Brien succeeded in tricking me to believe that these lies he composed were the truth about the war in Vietnam.   

Saving Ourselves

While formulating my thesis statement and my response I discovered that I’m not sure which elements of each text to compare. With O’Brien it was pretty clear what made me question my own understanding of truth. His inability to accept his own truth manipulates the reader to question whether I am aware of my own reality. With Vonnegut however, I am having more trouble. I’ve chosen to discuss the comparison between religious and scientific truths because in the story, I noticed many of the characters turning to either science or religion to help them understand reality. As the audience I immediately noticed how flawed these understandings were, but I also identified with the characters for simply trying to survive in this chaotic world we live in.

I often question my perspective on reality. I recently declared as an environmental studies major concentrating in (most likely) ecology. After making this distinction I wondered: is this was my new lens? One full of science and facts, no room for ethical questions or debate. I wonder if I’ve lost my ability to create and imagine, as if the world around me has become concrete and full of logical explanations. Okay this is a bit dramatic, but I typically over think things. Anyway, what if I am similar to Frank Hoenikker and am searching for a scientific explanation for what I don’t understand?

            Both books have made me question whether I am answering life’s persistent questions by seeking out someone else’s explanation and avoiding my own truth. Maybe that's the point though. It's human to be uncertain of oneself, and it's healthy that I'm trying to figure it out. Hopefully by analyzing the methods Vonnegut and O’Brien use to manipulate the reader into questioning his or her own perception of reality will help me find an explanation of my own.

Dreaming Saves Lives

In the chapter The Lives of the Dead in the novel The Things They Carried, O'Brien discusses dreams.  He begins the chapter by saying that he still dreams Linda, Ted Lavender, Kiowa, Curt Lemon, the man he killed, the old man, and the other bodies alive.  O'Brien then says, "They're all dead.  But in a story, which is a kind of dreaming, the dead sometimes smile and sit up and return to the world," (213).  Later in the chapter, he continues discussing dreams by saying, "The thing about a story is that you dream it as you tell it, hoping that others might then dream along with you, and in this way memory and imagination and language combine to make spirits in the head.  There is the illusion of aliveness," (218).  O'Brien strongly states that retelling a story makes you dream and in order for others to understand the story, they must dream it too and use their imaginations.  By dreaming these stories, these "spirits" are created in one's imagination and make the dead seem alive again.  Retelling these stories makes his dreams come alive and he opens the chapter by stating, "But this too is true: stories can save us," (213).  These stories, that are also dreams and memories, have saved O'Brien because he has been able to bring the dead back to life in his mind and convey his love for these people to others through his stories.  This ability to resurrect these people in his dreams is extremely powerful and while it has essentially saved his life, he shows the reader that it can save their lives too.  

Emotion

In The Things They Carried, Linda is a beautiful character.  She represents struggle and difference, but she also represents hope, courage, and healing.  She battles her illness with grace and a stoic demeanor.  Even when Nick Veenhof ripped the cap off her head, revealing her secret baldness and thus the secret about her illness, she handles it as best she can.  That moment was one of the most gut-wrenching in the whole novel.  The secret she tried to hide from her classmates and potentially herself, as she wanted to keep living a normal life, is rudely thrust into the open.  Linda feels as exposed as her translucent scalp.  Tim O’Brien (the author not character) wanted his readers to believe in the story unfolding, even though it was a fiction.  I think this moment for me was the most believable, and I still have trouble believing it never happened.  Though the truth is, it did happen, just with people all over the world not necessarily named Linda.  That is why this passage is so painful—because the feelings it portrays are so present in readers’  lives.  And ultimately, that is why O’Brien’s book is so wonderful; it makes even the moments that may have never happened to the reader relatable, especially in terms of the emotions portrayed.  The Things They Carried is a fiction, but the emotions it elicits are real and true.    

Not Another War Story

Tim O’Brien’s writing is the fictional tale of the life he has lived. He has lived an extraordinary life compared to most of his readers and only through his writing they are able to “feel what (he) felt,” and therefore “story-truth is truer sometimes than happening-truth” (179). In his writing he begins by generalizing what the characters in this novel carried: “can openers, pocket knives, heat tabs, wristwatches, dog tags,” then he adds detailed layers of fiction to the character for the readers to feel and understand them. He tells gruesome stories like the senseless death of Kiowa, but then retells them in: “Speaking of Courage,” “In the field” and  “Notes.” In each story he adds a fictional detail that makes the death even more drastic. We learn that Kiowa drowned in a sewage field and died with no dignity. Then we learn the different soldiers view towards the death and how they cope with the death.  Tim O’Brien wants to lay out the full image of things that happened during the Vietnam War and because, he himself did not live all that could have happened, he has to create fictional stories to fully give justice to the war.      

By telling the full story of the Vietnam War, Tim O’Brien is able to better understand his past; he “can look at things (he) never looked at. (He) attaches faces to grief and love and pity and God. (He) can be brave. (He) can make myself feel again” (180). Through his stories he dreams “hoping that others might then dream along with him, and in this way memory and imagination and language combine to make spirits in the head” (230). He tells these stories to save himself, he has gone through so much in his own life not necessarily due to his own choices and telling these stories and sharing his emotions allows him to heal himself and confront his confusion about the war and about he position in life.  There are different versions of him in the story because he is confused about his place and he has to be these different version due to the war.

By writing the story, he saves himself by better understanding himself and coming to terms. Therefore, “Timmy Saves Tim’s life,” Timmy is his young self the story and Tim is himself. His novel is not like any other typical novel with beginning, end and middle, it is mixture of short stories that combines to make the whole story. It is a form of “metafiction,” in which the author makes the readers determine fiction from reality. This is very important in the set up of Tim’s writing because it forces the reader to draw his or her own conclusion about the story. That I believe is Tim O’Brien’s main goal, he wants his readers to fully understand the Vietnam War and be just as confused as he is. 

Saving Timmy

 

            “I was Timmy then; now I’m Tim. But the essence remains the same” (223). This is what Tim the writer says about his younger self. While reading this passage, I tried to draw the connections. Nine-year-old Timmy lost his friend to a brain tumor. Twenty-three-year-old Tim lost multiple friends in the war. Nine-year-old Timmy lost his innocence. Twenty-three-year-old Tim’s chance at innocence is long gone. Timmy has become Tim, and yet years later, Tim the war veteran and writer still tries to save Timmy by writing stories. After taking the time to mull things over, I came to the conclusion that I agree with the Tim who is writing these stores. At their core, Timmy and Tim are the same. Both have experienced trauma in their lives, and will never be able to bring back the friends they’ve lost. Timmy dreamed up stories where he imagined Linda right before him, in the flesh, alive and healthy. Tim writes war stories that aren’t actually about war.              

            The stories and the people have changed, but Tim’s way of dealing with loss is the same. He started out trying to preserve Linda and consequently his innocence, by thinking of stories. Now Tim the writer is trying to preserve innocence by keeping the stories going. Earlier in the book, Tim says that he has never considered writing stories as a coping mechanism; I disagree. It’s not a coincidence that Timmy began storytelling after Linda’s death and returned to the same ritual many years after the war. Whether Tim realizes it or not he's handling death and trauma the same way Timmy did.