Lives of the Dead

AGENDA:

 1. Remember QUIZ  tomorrow on Vocabulary words from Things They Carried.  PLEASE, PLEASE STUDY!

2. What is the significance of the opening epigraph of the book mean?  Look up Andersonville

3. On index card, indicate your PAPER SUBJECT,  YOUR WORKING THESIS (It may change as you write your paper) and 2 sections of the book that you will use to support your thesis

 4.   Group DISCUSSIONS


Chapter 22: “The Lives of the Dead”
1.    How does the opening paragraph frame the story we are about to read?
 2.    Why is O'Brien unable to joke around with the other soldiers? Why does the old man remind him of Linda?
 3.    What is the function of the Linda plot in “The Lives of the Dead”? Consider in particular what it teaches him about death, memory, storytelling.
4.    What is the “moral” of the dead KIAs? Consider Mitchell Sanders' view.
5.    In many ways, this book is as much about stories, or the necessity of stories, as it is about the Vietnam War.  According to O’Brien, what do stories accomplish? Why does he continue to tell stories about the Vietnam War, about Linda?
6.    Reread the final two pages of this book. Consider what the young Tim O’Brien learns about storytelling from his experience with Linda. How does this knowledge prepare him not only for the war, but also to become a writer? Within the parameters of this story, how would you characterize Tim O’Brien’s understanding of the purpose of fiction? How does fiction relate to life, that is, life in the journalistic or historic sense?

Overall:

1. Assume for a moment, that the writer, Tim O’Brien, created a fictional main character, also called Tim O’Brien, to inhabit this novel. Why would the real Tim O’Brien do that? What would that accomplish in this novel? How would that strengthen a book about “truth”?

2. Finally, if O’Brien is trying to relate some essential details about emotional life – again as opposed to historic life – is he successful in doing that? Is he justified in tinkering with the facts to get at, what he would term, some larger, story-truth?

3. On the copyright page of the novel appears the following: “This is a work of fiction. Except for a few details regarding the author's own life, all the incidents, names, and characters are imaginary.” How does this statement affect your reading of the novel?