THE THINGS THEY CARRIED

1. There is an epigraph at the beginning of the text. What is an epigraph? How do writers use them?
2. Explain the idea of carrying in O’Brien’s book. What are things they carried (concrete and abstract) and by whom?
3. Compare the “things” the soldiers carried in Vietnam to the “things” soldiers are carrying in Iraq, both standard issue and personal objects. (You may want to post the question on the blog).
4. Discuss the use of third-person narration in the book. Since most of the book is personal and written from a first-person perspective, what purpose does third-person narration serve? Why is the title phrased in the third-person plural?
5. What is the role of women in The Things They Carried?
6. At the end of "On the Rainy River," the narrator makes a kind of confession: "The day was cloudy. I passed through towns with familiar names, through the pine forests and down to the prairie, and then to Vietnam, where I was a soldier, and then home again. I survived, but it's not a happy ending. I was a coward. I went to the war" (61). What does this mean?
7. Are there any clues about what O'Brien thinks of his narrator? What should the reader think of him?
8. One of the web sites treating O'Brien and his books leads to a site about magical realism. What is magical realism? Here's the site: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/4824/magreal.htm. Find other examples of magical realism in the novel.
9. Try taking any two chapters (or just Chapter 1 or just Chapter 3) and find all the metaphors and similes that O'Brien uses. List them and discuss how they work.
10. O'Brien talks about courage in a range of ways. Discuss.
11. Is the Vietnam War experience different from that of WWII?
12. "Stories are for joining the past to the future" (38). Is this statement true? Can "stories" affect the future?
13. "Love" is the title of an entire chapter. Are there other treatments of love in the work?
14. What do the following sentences mean? "I want you to know what I felt. I want you to know why story-truth is truer sometimes than happening-truth" (179).
15. Using O'Brien's The Things They Carried as a model, what is the weight of the things students carry?
16. What is the legacy of Vietnam for America today?
17. Is it possible to "win" a war? Are there any victors?

ACTIVITIES: PICK ONE OF THE FOLLOWING. You may team up with a partner or do independently.