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Compare And Contrast If I Die In A Combat Zone And The Things They Carried

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The novels If I Die in a Combat Zone and The Things They Carried were both written by Tim O’Brien. Tim O’Brien is a Vietnam War veteran and all of the novels he wrote are about his times in the war. He includes the same characters in the stories, but changed their names and descriptions. I do not believe that O’Brien wrote the books for any political reason. Both of the novels have very much in common including the style that it is written, and the stories that are told. There are also differences including the order of the stories, and the endings. These similarities and differences are important for the novels because it shows the diversity that different soldiers go through in times of war. The style that O’Brien writes in both novels is first person narrative. O’Brien …show more content…

In If I Die in a Combat Zone, the end is O’Brien going home from Vietnam. He says that there is no joy in leaving Vietnam. He says that he thought of the friends he gained and the friends he lost. He reminisced what he learned, and realized that he did not learn a lot. The ending of The Things They Carried is one last story that focused on O’Brien. It was the first time that he had seen a dead body in Vietnam. It then flashes back to his past where his girlfriend had died because of a brain tumor. That was the first time he had seen a dead body. The soldiers say that to keep a person alive is to always tell memories. But O’Brien didn’t do that, he just imagined that his girlfriend was still alive and waiting for him. Although collectively I did not like either of Tim O’Brien’s books, but I can say that they are well written. The reason I did not like the books was because of the graphics that were described. I understand that learning about the Vietnam War is important, and the horrific aspects are important to learn also, but I do not agree with describing in detail about bodies being blown to

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