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Kayla King
McGee
AP Lit 1A
January 13, 2012
War is Love
From gruesome “love stories” to tragic deaths Tim O’Brien captures the readers
attention as well as their hearts. In The Things They Carried O’Brien tells a story of the
death of Curt Lemon as if it were a love story. Although Lemon is repeatedly mentioned
throughout the chapter, the true story of his death is always incomplete. O’Brien is hardly
ever specific when mentioning details and states that he cannot seem to ever get them just
right when attempting to portray the beauty of the deadly scene.
The death of Curt Lemon affects the characters within the story as it does the
reader. In the mist of such a quiet day the laughter of soldiers is instantly interrupted as
Curt Lemon’s body shreds when blasted into the trees. Although his death seems
gruesome to any person reading, O’Brien describes the sun’s rays more so than Curt
Lemons body. To O’Brien Lemon’s death is nothing less than pure beauty. He thinks
about how Lemon saw it before he died; he wondered the beauty Lemon experienced
prior to his death.
Rather than mourning over the loss of Lemon, O’Brien attempts to find words in
order to perfectly describe the beauty. Curt Lemon (along with some other situations and
scenarios) made Tim O’ Brien realize the true beauty of war. As a reader, Curt Lemon’s
death represented reality; the harsh environment as well as the not-so-well-being of the
soldiers- mentally. The soldiers witnessed death regularly. Why mourn over death when
it is constantly reoccurring? O’Brien made something of Lemon’s death; something more
complex than death itself. Perhaps something as complex as war itself.
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The story of Curt Lemon not only tells of a soldier’s sad death, but it also
exemplifies the true horrors of war. Readers imagine war to be terrifying, bloody, and
hateful whereas O’Brien claims there is natural beauty to be uncovered. The images
readers have of war are altered as one tries to find a reason why war may be as beautiful
as love. The message? Beauty can be found everywhere, even if one must cock their head
out of confusion, it is there. O’Brien, serving as a prime example to readers, does not
look on the gloomy side but primarily on the other side.
With the National Anthem being a subject to the beauty of war, one can find that
it does exist.