Once again O'Brien's writing style intrigues me. Several times in class we have discussed his obvious detachment from his audience, but I wonder and the reason. Does O'Brien's isolate himself from the reader as a symptom of PSTD? Or does he accept that the reader will never understand his story?
In How to Tell a True War Story his words come across as bitter. He tells of Rat's suffering because of Lemon's death and the "cooze," who did not have the decency to write him back. A comrade pours his soul into the letter and she could not even respond. Is that what the reader is to O'Brien, a bunch of coozes, who will never respond because they do not understand his suffering. Ted Lavender humped his love for Martha and carried the guilt of not pressing his love physically and emotionally. He grasped onto his love for Martha as the reminder that he was a part of a separate world, where Martha was, but stuck in another. The passive, detached writing pattern in The Things They Carried implies a detachment from Vietnam, but like a recurring nightmare O'Brien cannot forget his experience is this other world. He writing tells of a man trapped in two worlds, and not quite belonging to either.
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