How to Tell a True War Story
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(Setting) What does the fog symbolize?
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(Character) ‘Nothing in his life Became him like
the leaving it’ (Macbeth)
In what way might that be said of Curt Lemon? How is what we might see as the
essence of his and Rat Kiley’s characters revealed in this brief episode?
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(Action) This story appears to ramble at times.
What ties its different parts together?
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(Style) What effects do the shifts of tense
produce?
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(Ideas) Identify the paradoxes in this story,
and attempt to explain them.
The Dentist
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(Setting) What view is taken here of the
military structure within which the men operate?
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(Character) Does it matter that some of this
information about Curt Lemon has already been given to us in the previous
chapter?
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(Action) How does this story’s opening paragraph
help to explain what happens in its final one? How does that give the story
shape, and offer the reader a sense of closure?
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(Style) Consider Tim O’Brien’s use of
colloquialisms (informal idiom) here.
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(Ideas) How in telling this story does Tim
O’Brien attempt to ‘guard against’ sentimentality? Why does he, perhaps, see it
as important to do that?
The Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong
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(Setting) ‘She had crossed to the other side.’
What is this ‘other side’ that Mary Anne may now inhabit?
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(Character) Trace the steps of Mary Anne’s
transformation, and the impact it has on Fossie. Show how, as she becomes more
alive, he becomes less so.
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(Action) ‘For Rat Kiley, I think, facts were formed
by sensation, not the other way around.’ How is Rat Kiley’s story-telling
affected by his personal closeness to the events he describes?
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(Style) How justified is Sanders’ complaint that
Rat Kiley is wrecking the ‘tone’ of the story by his digressions? (As part of
your response, consider Sanders’ explanation of what he means by ‘tone’.)
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(Ideas) If you have read Conrad’s Heart of
Darkness, discuss how some of its themes are echoed in this story. If you have
not, show how the story illustrates the idea that sometimes, in order to learn
new things, we must forget old ones.
Stockings
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(Setting) In what way is America, rather than
Vietnam, a setting for this whole collection of stories? Does Tim O’Brien, in
this story, write about America with pride?
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(Character) What mixed feelings towards Dobbins
does the platoon seem to have?
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(Action) Explain the mechanics of the
anti-climax at the end of this story.
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(Style) Analyse the rhythm and the flow of Tim
O’Brien’s prose here. What effect does it have, as we read?
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(Ideas) What connection exists between
sentimentality and superstition, according this story?
Church
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(Setting) Kiowa regards their decision to use
the pagoda as ‘just wrong’. Explain the meaning and force, here, of the phrase
‘just wrong’.
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(Character) What connections emerge among the
four characters in the story?
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(Action) Is it accurate to describe this story
as one in which nothing happens?
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(Style) The novelist Elizabeth Bowen wrote,
‘DIALOGUE Must (1) Further Plot; (2) Express Character.’ Does the dialogue in
Church pass that test - or challenge its validity?
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(Ideas) Why have Dobbins and Kiowa rejected
formal religion? What have they replaced it with?
The Man I Killed
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(Setting) Does Tim O’Brien write about the My
Khe community sympathetically? Compare his representation of it with his
comments on America at the beginning of Stockings.
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(Character) Where does all of this information
about the dead man come from? Does that raise questions about the storyteller’s
viewpoint?
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(Action) What is the dramatic impact of Tim
O’Brien’s stillness and silence throughout this story?
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(Style) Discuss the writer’s use of repetition
in this account.
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(Ideas) What is suggested here about the power
of stories?
Ambush
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(Setting) What is the predominant feature of
this story’s setting? What does it symbolise?
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(Character) What does Tim O’Brien’s continuing
need to ‘sort out’ this event tell us about him?
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(Action) Should this story have been placed
before The Man I Killed?
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(Style) How does Tim O’Brien, through his
writing style, make these events real for us?
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(Ideas) How is the insecurity of memory noted in
this story?
Style
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(Setting) What effect is Tim O’Brien aiming for
in having the girl dance silently, and in mentioning no sound other than that
of the soldiers talking?
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(Character) Is Henry Dobbins joking?
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(Action) Why does Tim O’Brien have Lieutenant
Cross send the gunships away at quite an early point in the story?
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(Style) How does Tim O’Brien suggest the
difference between the girl’s dancing and Azar’s?
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(Ideas) Explain the story’s title.
