Extended Metaphor

"They carried the soldier's greatest fear, which was the fear of blushing" (page 21). The soldiers in the war never want anyone else to know of their weaknesses. If they are afraid of death, they joke about it. "They were actors" (page 20). They had to pretend they were not afraid of anything. Actors are not themselves when they become the character. Almost everything about themselves is forgotten to fully become the character. The soldiers could not always admit to the realities of war because it was too much for the human mind to cope with. The soldiers had to develop different personalities and mindsets to cope with the war.

Motif

The phrase, "they carried", is repeated over and over again in the book. This phrase is also within the title of the book. The phrase pulls the reader into the war, causing a better understanding of the realities of war. While the beginning of the book uses the phrase most often, I noticed it seemed to be implied throughout the rest of the book. The book goes back and forth between the then and now. Tim O'Brien was in the war and then the story goes to the present time as he thinks about the war. The story follows some of the characters and for Norman Bowker, he carried guilt for letting his friend go. He later hangs himself. The books relates how one event can change lives and alter personalites. The war changed people and they will always have to live with the memories of the war.

Anthropomorphism (personification)

"Imagination was a killer" (page 11). The most frightening part of war is the unknown. War is unpredictable when accounting for the amount of wounded, dead, or missing people. There is also no answer for an easy end to a war and there is no answer to the outcome of the war. The unknown allows for people to make up there own answers to all of the questions. In the book, this quote refers to the part where soldiers go on tunnel duty and the soldiers wonder what happens to the people down in the tunnel. They begin to scare themselves with all of the possible outcomes. The soldiers could die, or they could be trapped alive. The unknown is scary for most people. For most people, the reason for the Vietnam war was unknown and the outcome of the war was also a mystery.

The Things They Carried

As I started to read the book, I noticed that O'Brien would describe the things the soldiers physically carried and then something they emotionally carried. "He [Jimmy Cross] carried a strobe light and the responsibility for the lives of his men" (page 5). That would be a lot to carry and I would have a hard time coping with that thought. I would not be able to function under the immense pressure that other people's lives depended on me. O'Brien states how heavy the physical items are that the soldiers carry and it directly links to the heaviness of the fear and anxiety the soldiers also carried.
"They carried all they could bear, and then some, including a silent awe for the terrible power of the things they carried" (page 7). This quote really brought me back to the reality of the wartime draft. These people were not soldiers; they were draftees. They were forced to come into a war did not support or understand.