Jimmy Cross Symbolism

“The Things They Carried” is a story about what is most important to a soldier, practical and emotional. Jimmy Cross tells how pictures, letters, bibles, and journals were just as important as guns, medical supplies, and radio contact. A soldier couldn’t do what he does without some ties to real life, beyond the war. As Jimmy Cross said, “It wasn’t cruelty, just stage presence. They were actors and the war came at them in 3-D.” The letters and pictures helped them stay grounded, a hope for a life outside of the war. “The Things They Carried” was in Third Person Omniscient. For most of the story, Jimmy Cross is the only soldier we know the thoughts of, when he thinks things like, ‘Her legs, he thought, were almost certainly the legs of a virgin.’