The Things They Carried

In many ways, The Things They Carried is a departure from the usual Vietnam literary genre. I don't think O'Brien challenges my understanding of the Vietnam war so much as he deepens my understanding of human nature.

Prior to reading The Things They Carried, I already held a fairly substantial knowledge of the Vietnam war, the anti-war movement, and the circumstances surrounding the actual combat on the ground. The Things They Carried did not provide me with a historic record or account of the important events during the Vietnam era. Rather it used the Vietnam War as a medium to relate deeper ideas concerning human nature and emotion.

In that sense, O'Brien differs from other authors who have written about Vietnam. The Things They Carried is not about firefights or dramatic battle scenes. It is about using the novel format to help the reader comprehend how Vietnam exposes human emotions that had previously lay dormant (when the threat of death is not present).

O'Brien conveys these heavy thoughts and ideas very uniquely and cleverly. He plays with genre expectations and the ideas of non-fictional truth. He uses the concept of weight to allow the reader to gain an understanding of the psychological burdens people carry. The Things They Carried is most different from a Vietnam novel in that it is not trying to educate the reader on war; it is trying to educate the reader on life, and I think O'Brien is successful in doing so.