The Vietnam in Me Tim O'Brien

The Vietnam in Me

The Vietnam In Me: Multiple Truths in the Life of Tim O’Brien

 “The Vietnam in Me.” New York Times Magazine, October 2, 1994.

Comment:
Tim O’Brien has explained multiple times throughout the novel that everything he writes is absolute fiction, even though it may be inspired by actual events, but maintains a special term which is classified story truth (in the sense that it’s true that it is a story and may have happened). He also uses the term happening-truth, which is what is actually occurring in reality. These two clash with the release of the short story “Field Trip” and the article “The Vietnam In Me”, both about his return to Vietnam.
The first, “Field Trip”, is a prime example of story truth, where O’Brien speaks about how he and his daughter return to Vietnam and he goes to the field where Norman Bowker let go of Kiowa and O’Brien wades in and buries Kiowa’s moccasins at the spot where he went under. He then has a heart-to-heart conversation with his daughter on the nature of the Vietnam War and gives a great deal of polished-over romanticism on loss and grief and duty (almost as if you combined Nathaniel Hawthorne, Keanu Reeves, and Tom Clancy for a made-for-TV movie).
Meanwhile, “The Vietnam In Me” is the realistic, factual account of O’Brien’s return to Vietnam, with a female friend (not his daughter), and his return to his own personal killing fields (apologies for the incorrect placement of that term, seeing as killing fields were in Cambodia and not Vietnam). In this account, it’s as though O’Brien allowed Larry Clark to follow him around with a camera and detail everything on his journey through ‘Nam. From visiting the minefields that took the lives of his friends with former VC and NVA officers, to the village of My Lai where American militarism truly failed in 1968, and even to stuffy, hot Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) hotels where he battles his own personal demons on the “terrible things” he did during the war, though not giving any evidence as to what those things were. The article even takes a turn for the even darker with his constant contemplation of suicide after his female friend leaves him. While this article is much more gritty than the short story, one thing remains the same: his feelings. Throughout both pieces, he cannot escape this insufferable sadness and guilt over the unknown.
“The Vietnam In Me” is more true because O’Brien says that truth is in the gut and this is where O’Brien’s gut is. Based off his writing style alone, one can just literally feel the emotions sweep off the page and hit him or her right in the chest while with “Field Trip”, it’s as if one can almost see the time it took in calculating the perfect emotions and perfect snippets of dialogue for each character from the uncertaintity as to what to say at Kiowa’s death spot to him telling his daughter that the Vietnamese was not angry at him because “all that’s over now”. Almost cliche even though it works wonderfully with the rest of the book. One shouldn’t get upset about the fact that one story is based on fact and the other is based in fiction; it is one’s personal choice to like or dislike whatever they read. And the question of getting upset brings up another question of whether it would be better to stick to the truth or to emotional fiction, and once again, it is whatever one wants. Personally, I would like truth with emotions clearly portrayed so not only do I know what actually happened, but I also know what the people were feeling at the time.

The Things They Carried (cont.)

Agenda:

Discussion Questions:

Chapter 19: “Field Trip”
1.    Why does O’Brien return to the shit field? 2.    What is the point of putting Kiowa’s moccasins in the ground (burying them)? 3.    Explain the significance of the final sentence. Who or what is “all finished”?
 
Chapter 20: “The Ghost Soldiers”
1.    What does “The Ghost Soldiers” add to the book that we have almost completed? Does it provide any new insights, perspectives, or experiences about any of the characters? What do you think its function in the overall narrative might be?
2.    Does your opinion of O'Brien change throughout the course of the novel? How so? How do you feel about his actions in “The Ghost Soldiers”?
3.    “The Ghost Soldiers” is one of the only stories of The Things They Carried in which we don't know the ending in advance. Why might O'Brien want this story to be particularly suspenseful?
4.    Explain the significance of the title of this chapter.

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? 

Discussion Questions/Vietnam War Poetry

AGENDA:

Finish presented the group discussions from yesterday.

READ/DISCUSS:   Vietnam War Poetry Handout

Driving through Minnesota During the Hanoi Bombings

By Robert Bly b. 1926 Robert Bly

We drive between lakes just turning green;   

Late June. The white turkeys have been moved   

A second time to new grass.

How long the seconds are in great pain!   

Terror just before death,

Shoulders torn, shot

From helicopters. “I saw the boy

being tortured with a telephone generator,”   

The sergeant said.

“I felt sorry for him

And blew his head off with a shotgun.”   

These instants become crystals,

Particles

The grass cannot dissolve. Our own gaiety   

Will end up

In Asia, and you will look down in your cup   

And see

Black Starfighters.

Our own cities were the ones we wanted to bomb!   

Therefore we will have to

Go far away

To atone

For the suffering of the stringy-chested   

And the short rice-fed ones, quivering   

In the helicopter like wild animals,

Shot in the chest, taken back to be questioned.



 

Literary Terms for Quiz #2 for Friday, 9/26

Literary Terms Test for quiz on Friday, Sept. 26

• caricature
• clause
• colloquial/colloqualism
• conceit
• conceit
• connotation
• denotation
• diction
• didactic
• euphemism
• extended metaphor

Style, Speaking of Courage, Notes, In the Field

Group One (Speaking of Courage):

(1) To begin with, why is this story called "Speaking of Courage"? Assume the title does NOT hold any irony. In what sense does this story speak of courage?

(2) Why does Norman Bowker still feel inadequate with seven metals? And why is Norman's father such a presence in his mental life? Would it really change Norman's life if he had eight metals, the silver star, etc.?

(3) What is the more difficult problem for Norman--the lack of the silver star or the death of Kiowa? Which does he consider more and why?

(4) Why is Norman unable to relate to anyone at home? More importantly, why doesn't he even try?

 

Group Two (Notes):

(1) In "Notes," Tim O'Brien receives a letter from Norman Bowker, the main character in "Speaking of Courage." Why does O'Brien choose to include excerpts of this seventeen page letter in this book? What does it accomplish?

(2) Consider for a moment that the letter might be made-up, a work of fiction. Why include it then?

(3) In "Notes," Tim O'Brien says, "You start sometimes with an incident that truly happened, like the night in the shit field, and you carry it forward by inventing incidents that did not in fact occur but that nonetheless help to clarify and explain it." What does this tell you about O'Brien's understanding of the way fiction relates to real life?

(4) Compare and contrast possible versions of Kiowa's death in "Speaking of Courage" and the end of "Notes".  Who is responsible?

Group Three (In the Field): 

“In the Field”
1.    Briefly summarize the plot and style of the story. Is this story more of a “true” war story than the account in the chapter “Speaking of Courage”?
2.    What point of view is used to narrate “In the Field”? 
3.    Why is the young man not identified in the story? What is the character’s purpose in the narrative? 
4.    In “In The Field,” O'Brien writes, “When a man died, there had to be blame.” What does this mandate do to the men of O'Brien's company? Are they justified in thinking themselves at fault? How do they cope with their own feelings of culpability? Consider all of the characters.
 5.    What, in the end, is the significance of the shit field story (or stories)?

Group 4:
 “Good Form”
1.    In “Good Form,” O'Brien casts doubt on the veracity of the entire novel. Why does he do so? Does it make you more or less interested in the novel? Does it increase or decrease your understanding? What is the difference between “happening-truth” and “story-truth?”

RETEST QUIZ #1 and CONVERSATIONAL ROUNDTABLE

AGENDA:

RETEST QUIZ:   Literary Terms retest Quiz #1.  Student.s can take the retest to get a better grade. I will count the higher of the two grades.  Be sure to put your name on the paper! 

DISCUSSION:   Work in groups to complete and share their Conversational Roundtable charts for The Things They Carried.  Collect the charts for classwork credit.  Be sure to put your name on your papers.
I’ll pass them back tomorrow.

HOMEWORK:  Read to page 181 for discussion tomorrow –“In the Field “ and “Good Form” for Discussion tomorrow.  Continue to work on AP packet.

PSAT Meeting

PSAT meeting in the MAINSTAGE

HMWK:  Do reading for Monday.  Go over the "A" vocabulary for a retest.
On Monday, you will be going over the "Conversational Roundtable" handout about "The Man I Killed" and "Ambush" with your group

Also on Monday, you will receive a packet of AP passages for homework, due at the end of the week on Friday.