The Things They Carried Guided Questions 1 
“The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien Due Friday, October 31, 2014 @ 11:59 p.m. on Schoology
Questions for Discussion and Style & Structure or aguilar.english@gmail.com.
*Please type your answers. Complete sentences and thoughts is always expected.
Questions for Discussion
1. The story begins with a paragraph about Jimmy Cross and his relationship with Martha. What does Martha represent to Cross? Why might it be significant that Cross obsesses about whether or not she is a virgin? How does Cross’s feelings for Martha change toward the end of the story, and how does this change point the way to one of the themes of the story?
2. What role does Hollywood play in this story? How are the soldiers’ expectations of war and death shaped by the movies? Where in the story does Hollywood fantasy meet reality? What point is O’Brien making?
3. According to the narrator, “The things they carried were largely determined by necessity” (para.2), were “partly a function of rank, partly of field specialty” (para. 6), “varied by mission” (para. 14), and “were determined to some extent by superstition” (para. 28). Which is the strongest factor in determining what they carried? Do you find any irony in in the things they carried?
4. Jimmy Cross carries “the responsibility for the lives of his men” (para. 7) and ultimately cannot bear the burden. What does he literally and figuratively shed in order to bear that weight following Lavender’s death? What point is O’Brien making?
5. Why do you think the medic would need “M&M’s for especially bad wounds” (para. 9)?
6. In paragraph 29, the soldiers find the burned corpse of a teenage Vietcong soldier at the bottom of a ditch, and Sanders says, “there’s a definite moral here,” before cutting off the boy’s thumb and giving it to Bowker. Dobbins doesn’t see the moral, and ultimately, they decide, “There it is.” What do they mean by that? Look at paragraph 75, where O’Brien talks more about the meaning of that phrase. Does “The
Questions for Discussion and Style & Structure or aguilar.english@gmail.com.
*Please type your answers. Complete sentences and thoughts is always expected.
Questions for Discussion
1. The story begins with a paragraph about Jimmy Cross and his relationship with Martha. What does Martha represent to Cross? Why might it be significant that Cross obsesses about whether or not she is a virgin? How does Cross’s feelings for Martha change toward the end of the story, and how does this change point the way to one of the themes of the story?
2. What role does Hollywood play in this story? How are the soldiers’ expectations of war and death shaped by the movies? Where in the story does Hollywood fantasy meet reality? What point is O’Brien making?
3. According to the narrator, “The things they carried were largely determined by necessity” (para.2), were “partly a function of rank, partly of field specialty” (para. 6), “varied by mission” (para. 14), and “were determined to some extent by superstition” (para. 28). Which is the strongest factor in determining what they carried? Do you find any irony in in the things they carried?
4. Jimmy Cross carries “the responsibility for the lives of his men” (para. 7) and ultimately cannot bear the burden. What does he literally and figuratively shed in order to bear that weight following Lavender’s death? What point is O’Brien making?
5. Why do you think the medic would need “M&M’s for especially bad wounds” (para. 9)?
6. In paragraph 29, the soldiers find the burned corpse of a teenage Vietcong soldier at the bottom of a ditch, and Sanders says, “there’s a definite moral here,” before cutting off the boy’s thumb and giving it to Bowker. Dobbins doesn’t see the moral, and ultimately, they decide, “There it is.” What do they mean by that? Look at paragraph 75, where O’Brien talks more about the meaning of that phrase. Does “The