A War Story is A Love Story

In the work of fiction The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, the author said that this war story is not about war, it is about love and memory. This is true because if his story is only about war, the story would be incomplete and would make us feel disconnected. After the layers of storytelling, love is mixed into the war story, making it a love story.

When people are telling a story, they tend to add their own emotion and interpretation into the story, which Tim O’Brien describes as story truth. The story of Curt Lemon’s death was told multiple times. In the different versions of the story, the emotion that has been conveyed is different. One of them deals with Rat Kiley’s guilt. He was playing catch with Curt Lemon, and they were “laughing, and then [Curt Lemon] was dead.”(O’Brien 74) From this line, the reader can already predict what Rat Kiley’s feeling was. He loved Curt Lemon, they were good friends, but then Curt Lemon dead. However, What Rat Kiley did was now what the reader is likely to expect —- He tortured a baby buffalo, which made this story more dramatic, and the reader would be like the old woman that questions the story being a love story. It is natural for a writer mixes in emotion and you feel the story has become a love story. Another similar instance is after Kiowa was “under the mud and water, folded in with the war, and [the Alpha Company’s] only thought was to find him and dig him out and then move on to someplace dry and warm.” (O’Brien 155) When other people died, Azar often jokes about them; however, he shut up this time. This shows the importance of Kiowa for them. Kiowa was a figure that was full of love, and the men in Alpha Company loved him. He was like a lubricant for the conflict between the men. The Alpha Company’s action of digging him up no matter what truly reflects their love toward Kiowa, which also shows that love is an important aspect of a war story, therefore, cannot be omitted.  

Some of the stories in the The Things They Carried are started because of love. Love is a important piece in everyone’s life. Under the circumstance of war, love is extremely important. Love gives the soldiers comfort and a sense of hope and home. Henry Dobbins warps his girlfriend’s pantyhose around his neck every time before he goes onto ambush. “He liked putting his nose into the nylon and breathing in the scent of his girlfriend’s body; he liked the memories this inspired; he sometimes slept with the stockings up against his face, the way an infant sleeps with a flannel blanket, secure and peaceful.” (O’Brien 111) His girlfriend’s pantyhose, which represents his love toward his girlfriend comforts him and gives him a reason to survive the war and come back home and back to his memories. Although her girlfriend left him, “the magic doesn’t go away.”(O’Brien 112).

Love is not only a component of a war story, the reason for a love story and a war story to exist is also the same. Talking or writing about memories is therapeutic. Love stories and war stories make dead people alive and they act as a outlet for pressure. When Tim O’Brien received Norman Bowker’s letter, “it occurred to [O’Brien] that the act of writing had led me through a swirl of memories that might otherwise have ended in paralysis or worse.” (O’Brien 152) Norman Bowker wasn’t able to tell his story which led him to hang himself. Tim O’Brien has realized the magic of storytelling since he was Timmy. He started dreaming about the story, and that story was a love story. His first love, Linda, died suddenly, much like what happens to people in war. Tim O’Brien has realized that by telling the love story, he was able to save all the memories and make dead people alive again in his stories. “[Tim O’Brien ]realize it is as Tim trying to save Timmy’s life with a story.”(O’Brien 233) He saw the similarities between love stories and war stories and made The Things They Carried a love story.

The elements making a love story is similar to those making a war story which is guilt, death, memory, and many more components. Love stories and war stories are functionally and structurally similar, which is the reason for Tim O’Brien to say his story is a love story.