Tuesday, May 19, 2020
The Elusiveness of War and the Tenuousness of Morality in...
The Elusiveness of War and the Tenuousness of Morality in Tim Oââ¬â¢Brienââ¬â¢s ââ¬Å"The Things They Carried,â⬠ââ¬Å"How to Tell a True War Story,â⬠and ââ¬Å"Styleâ⬠nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;In the novel The Things They Carried, Tim Oââ¬â¢Brien demonstrates how exposure to the atrocities of nations at war leads to the soldiers having skewed perspectives on what is right and wrong, predominantly at times when the purpose of the war itself appears elusive. The ambiguity that consumes the stories of ââ¬Å"The Things They Carriedâ⬠and ââ¬Å"How to Tell a True War Storyâ⬠is displayed with irony, for the ââ¬Ëmoralââ¬â¢ of such war stories is that there is no moral at all. Oââ¬â¢Brien portrays the character Mitchell Sanders as an observer who seeks the morals to be found through the warâ⬠¦show more contentâ⬠¦Lavenderââ¬â¢s death also reaches a point of irony when Sanders claims that the moral to the situation is in fact the immorality of it, saying ââ¬Å"The moralââ¬â¢s pretty obvious. Stay away from drugs. No joke, theyââ¬â¢ll ruin your day every timeâ⬠(20). Sanders is focusing on Lavenderââ¬â¢s corr upt ways in order to convey the lesson of his death, and he is ironically doing so as he partakes in those very debauched ways himself. nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;Similarly to Crossââ¬â¢ approach to dealing with the death of Lavender, Rat Kiley experiences much difficulty and trauma from the death of his friend Curt Lemon and feels partially responsible. Following Lemonââ¬â¢s death, Kiley went into the mountains and ââ¬Å"came across a baby VC water buffalo [â⬠¦]He stepped back and shot it through the right front knee[â⬠¦]Curt Lemon was dead. Rat Kiley had lost his best friend in the worldâ⬠(78-79). The frustrations of being a soldier in Vietnam and fighting at times for a cause that has no apparent solution causes the men to have questionable judgment. When it comes to upholding the standards they used to abide by when living in a place free of so much animosity and mortality, the soldiers must first overcome the oppressive weight of the war that confuses their moral views. nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;nbsp;Moral ambiguity is clear in the short story of ââ¬Å"Styleâ⬠as Henry Dobbins strongly defends a young girl,
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.