On the Rainy River

Intro--Think, Pair, Share
Quickwrite:

What are some of the things you know about the Vietnam War?  What are some of the things you would like to know more about as background for this novel?


Country Joe and the Fish:  "Fixin'  to Die Rag"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DiWcDt8566g
Platoon trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPi8EQzJ2Bg 
www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6rY5WN5X8A
www.youtube.com/watch?v=dP4GaprkAJg

PBS: American Experience, Vietnam
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/series/index.html

On the Rainy River slides:

http://www.curriculumcompanion.org/public/lite/mcdougalLittell/ml10/pdf/ml10_u4p2_rainy.pdf

Adrienne Rich, "Diving Into the Wreck"
http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15228

We are, I am, you are
by cowardice or courage
the one who find our way
back to this scene
carrying a knife, a camera
a book of myths
in which
our names do not appear.

The id, the ego, the super ego: Freud's theory

http://psychology.about.com/od/theoriesofpersonality/a/personalityelem.htm 

A thought about symbolism: Elroy's role (from Shmoop)

On the Rainy River

So, O'Brien didn't really work in a meatpacking plant the summer before he went to Vietnam, and he didn't go up to the Canadian border to try to get away from the war and then chicken out and return home. It's a symbol for his mental state at the time. He can't get the nightmarish idea of slaughter out of his head – it's all he can think about – and so he thinks about running away. He's on the edge. Eventually, though, he backs off the edge. He doesn't go to Canada.
Elroy Berdahl is an important symbol in all of this, as O'Brien explicitly states:
He was the true audience. He was a witness, like God, or like the gods, who look on in absolute silence as we live our lives, as we make our choices or fail to make them. (On the Rainy River.74)
If Berdahl is God (or your deity of choice – atheists, feel free to use the universe as a stand-in), then God is ambivalent here. He doesn't push Tim to make one choice or another, and he doesn't judge Tim either way. He's simply there, watching, and his presence is felt.







www.youtube.com/watch?v=dP4GaprkAJgwww.youtube.com/watch?v=dP4GaprkAJg