thingstheycarried

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__The Things They Carried__ is a collection of similar short war stories written by Tim O’Brien. So far it is all about a platoon of soldiers who are in Vietnam. It basically explains all about the things they carried with them. My group, John, James, and I, read to page 59, or chapter: Enemies. It was a little bit of short notice because John got the book on Wednesday so it was a lot of reading, but we did it. We decided that page because there are 233 pages in the book and we have to read about 47 pages each week if we want to finish it in five weeks, and we basically rounded up to the nearest chapter in the book.=====

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During the meeting we started with James D. and he didn’t remember to finish his part, B and C. he found quotes on the spot and made up some questions. The quotes were a little weak, but the questions were solid and helped change the perspective of the book. After that John asked us about what we thought was going to happen to Tim O’Brien, the protagonist and soldier, and we all answered. Then he started a conversation on why we think he went to Canada, but turned back as soon as he got there and if we think that he will die when he got sent to war. We came to the conclusion that he won’t die; we decided that because the main character never dies but we do think that the girl he loves will or someone else close to him will. That concluded our discussion on Friday, October 1.=====

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James Otteson- Our group decided that the book is written in a conversational type discussion. It seems like he is telling us a bunch of different stories that are separated by flashbacks and memories. It doesn't really use words that we don't understand but it uses a lot of abbreviations that we don't understand. For example: the ARVN infantry soldiers. we decided that the book was geared towards a group of people that are a little bit older than us, perhaps sophomores or juniors.=====

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John Pirsos-(Three Quotes 10/8/10) 1. "Jesus Christ,man, I write this beautiful ....... letter, I slave over it, and what happens? The dumb cooze never writes back." This quote was said by Kurt Lemon's friend after Kurt Lemon died. His friend sent a letter to his sister after he died and he was just saying that he was a great man and you shouldn't be upset because he was a good man. He poured his sole into this letter and she didn't write back and that is why he was so mad at her.=====

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2. "All right," I said,"What's the moral?" He is referring to the moral of war. Two people were having a conversation and they were arguing about war. One person said there is moral to war and the other responded by saying what's the moral but the other soldier wasn't able to reply to that question. We thought it might be suggesting that there is no moral to war.=====

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3. "Well that's Nam," he said. "Garden of Evil, over hear, many every sin's real fresh and original." We came to the conclusion that in Vietnam, even if you believe that you aren't supposed to kill anyone, you still have to kill people and go against everything you believe in because someone is commanding you to.=====

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John Pirsos-(Three questions 10/8/10) 1. What do you think was making those strange sounds when they were in the mountains? Our group came to the conclusion that there were no sounds but they were just hearing things because they had to remain silent for a week and the brain can't process not hearing any noise at all so their minds made up sounds that they heard but no one else could.=====

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2. Why did the author write about their silent mission (which was them being completely silent for one week to listen for enemy activity) if it seemed really boring and it just included them hearing things that weren't really there? We thought that the author wrote about this to bring the point across about the hardships of war and even if you don't want to do something boring or hard, you still have to do it because someone of a higher rank told you to do it.=====

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We thought that she never received the letter because back in the war, it was very rare for a letter to be sent from Vietnam to the United States because the messenger could have been killed or the letter could have been lost, stolen, or misplaced.=====

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During class on Friday, one of the things we talked about was the fact that people are often in these suits where they can’t feel anything, and their faces were covered so they can’t see anything either. When this happens a person inside goes insane after about 2 days. Not insane as in just spa zing out, basically literally going mentally insane. We also talked about the qualities of a true war story, and what needs to be written, and what emotions are supposed to be conveyed.=====

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Rat Kiley had written a letter to his sister on the issue above. He pours his heart out to her, even though he happens to hate her. This dead friend was Curt Lemon. We talked about how it was wrong for her to not respond to his letter, after he had put his heart and soul into it. But then again who could blame her because of all of the grief? But that doesn’t excuse the coldness, as it was almost if not just as much a loss for her as it was for him.=====

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1. ...Sometimes I want to eat this place. The whole country-- the dirt, the death--I just want to swallow it up and have it inside of me. That's how I feel. It's like this appetite. I get scared sometimes--lots of times--but it's not //bad//. You know? I feel close to myself.=====

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2. His jaw was in his throat, his upper lip and teeth were gone, his one eye was shut, his other eye was a star-shaped hole, his eyebrows were thin and arched like a woman's, his nose was undamaged, there was a slight tear at the lobe of one ear, his clean black hair was swept upward into a cowlick at the rear of the skull, his forehead was lightly freckled, his fingernails were clean, the skin at his left cheek was peeled back in three ragged strips, his right cheek was smooth and hairless, there was a butterfly on his chin, his neck was open to the spinal cord and the blood there was thick and shiny and it was this wound that killed him.===== 3. "I will go get her. I bring her out." said Fossie. Rat shook his head. "Your decision. I was you, though, no way I'd mess around with any Greenie types, not for nothing." "It's Mary Anne in there." "Sure I know that. All the same, I'd knock real extra super polite."

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A: She changed because of the war. We think that the war over powered her and forced her to conceal herself from the rest of the world; for example, like a freshman in college who gets overwhelmed and, in response, cuts him self of from the rest of the world.=====

A: Because he was worried that she would think he was a monster and a killer. He didn’t want to lose her trust and set a bad example for her.
John Pirsos 10/16/10

In book club on Friday, we discussed different chapters of the book because the whole thing doesn't seem to be tying together. But at this point, we were able to say that Rat Kiley is the main character. The three of us saw that other characters come and go throughout the book. One chapter we discussed was "The Man I Killed." This chapter seemed to be one of the more important chapters in the section that we read over the week. We weren't really sure what exactly it meant right away but after we discussed it, we were able to come to a logical conclusion. We came to the conclusion that in the chapter, it seemed like a look to the future and a little girl asks her dad(Rat Kiley) if he ever killed someone. Since she was little, we thought Kurt didn't want to say he killed someone and have his daughter think he is a killer or a murderer. So instead he told her a white lie and told her he never killed anyone in the war. After that, we went over the quotes and questions. There wasn't much to talk about after that, because James Douglas (our discussion leader) didn't seem prepared. It seemed that he didn't have enough information about the book to be the discussion leader.

James Douglas

This book has a very sad demeanor. For example, Fossey loses his girlfriend that he loves and is loyal to for an unspecified and debatable reason, which may be because she just lost interest in him or because she found another guy, but he lost her. Hearbreak is never a good thing, so that obviously shows how this is a sad book. Also, this is a war book, so of course it’s going to have at least some sadness in it, it’s common sense. It’s also not just about any war, but about the Vietnam War, which is one of the most if not the most horrific wars in history.

John Pirsos

In week four, I was the discussion leader. In the section that we read, there were a lot of symbols. One symbol we discussed was the "shit field" in which Kiowa died. We didn't think it was actually a "shit field", we thought it was just a mud field that was very mushy and gross and they just called it a "shit field" for an exaggeration." Another symbol that we talked about was the symbol of when Jimmy Cross went back to the mud field 20 years after Kiowa died. We thought it symbolized how much Jimmy Cross appreciated his good friend.

Week 5 A-James Otteson B-John Pirsos C-John Pirsos D-James Douglas

James Otteson

We do not recommend this book for our age group. Even though it is a great book, it is very confusing and hard to follow. No, most of us have never read another war book. We unanimously agree that it would be a bad idea to put this in the school curriculum.

John Pirsos Questions

1. Why do you think Tim denied the fact of Linda's death? Our group thought that he was in denial about it because he was only in the fifth grade and to make him feel better he said to himself that it wasn't true.

2. On Tim and Linda's first date, why do you think that they barely said a word to each other? We thought they didn't speak much because they were very shy and they didn't know what to say and they were only in the fourth grade.

3. Why do you think Tim didn't think it was Linda in the casket? We thought that he was still in denial and he didn't want to believe it.

John Pirsos Quotes

1. "Jeez," I must've said,"What a cap."

2. "She's dead," he said.

3. It didn't seem real I thought. A mistake I thought.