Symbolic Meaning Of Weight example essay topic

Symbolism in stories is dependent on how the author writes, the title, and the characters. Titles in literature are very important to the symbolism of a story an example of this is Tim O'Brien's "The Things They Carried". As the story goes on it shows not only the literal meaning of what they carried but also symbolically the burdens that they had mentally. In the literal sense O'Brien talks about what different members of a platoon in Vietnam carried. This helps him to move to a more symbolic sense at the end of the story. He starts by talking about necessities and slowly moves on to what they carried to remind them that there was a world out side of the war.

"Among the necessities or near necessities were p-38 can openers, pocket knifes, heat tabs, wrist watches, dog tags, mosquito repellent, chewing gum, candy, cigarettes, salt tablets, packets of Kool-Aid, lighters, matches, sewing kits, Military Payment Certificates, C rations, and two or three canteens of water". But as the story moves on it shows other things that were considered necessities to them even though to some one else they might seem a luxury. Such as Kiowa carrying his grandfather's hatchet. These are obviously not necessities to others but were one for them. In the story the theme of weight kept coming up. Literally he meant the weight of each weapon, ration, and body armor, ECT... "it was SOP for each man to carry a steel-centered, nylon-covered flak jacket, which weight 6.7 pounds...

". Weight is used in this story to help show the symbolic meaning of weight later on in the story. "What they carried varied by mission". Knowing the different dangers throughout the land also added to their burden, making them carry even more such as mosquito netting, machetes, mine detectors, and even things that didn't have much use such as Kiowa carrying the New Testament and Dave Jensen carrying his night-sight vitamins.

All of "The Things They Carried" helped to add to the stress of the war and also help to quell it, they carried what they needed. Through the use of his the objects he describes he also shows the symbolic meaning of everything they had to carry. They had fear and memories two of the heaviest burdens a human can carry, they had memories of friends lost in this world and one left behind in the old world. "Ted Lavender, who was scared, carried tranquilizers until he was shot" this shows the weight of fear in Lavender, the need to take a just so he could stay straight on missions.

It also shows how men could just die that easy all the time and that alone is a mental burden almost to heavy to bear. In the conversation between Sanders and Dobbins they talk about the moral of finding the VC solider. The moral turns out to be that there is no moral, showing that they knew that they shouldn't have been there in the first place. They were fighting an enemy much bigger than the Viet Cong they were fighting their own minds, their own fears, their own burdens. "They carried the land itself -- - Vietnam, the place, the soil -- - a powdery orange-red dust...

". This quote shows exactly how heavy a burden the war was. It wasn't a battle it was a march, an endless march from one village to the next doing what they had to. Patting old men and children down. To hump something was to carry it but it implied beyond the literal meaning. It implied so much more than just carrying something, it meant a burden you could hump a tent or you could hump your memories, your love; it meant hardship and that's all they felt.

Lieutenant Jimmy Cross carried the heaviest burden out of anyone, the burden of love. Cross-knew that Martha didn't feel the same way about him though, but he still dreamed of it. "He would imagine romantic camping trips into the White Mountains in New Hampshire". Nothing can be harder than loving someone that doesn't feel the same way about you, this must have made it even harder getting letters that were "mostly chatty, elusive on the matter of love".

Sometimes his love for Martha even made him a bad leader like the day Ted Lavender died. Lee Strunk went into a foxhole that day looking for stray VC's when Cross started to think about Martha and no matter how hard he could not keep his mind at the dangers at hand, "he tried to concentrate on Lee Strunk and the war, all the dangers, but his love was to much for him", then as Lavender was coming back from taking a he was shot in the back of the head. This event upset Cross and made him realize that he could not let this hinder him anymore, "He felt shame. He d himself. He had loved Martha more than his men, and as a consequence Lavender was now, and this was something he would have to carry like a stone in his stomach for the rest of the war".

She was in a different world and it could not carry one like this anymore, he couldn't put his feelings ahead of his men ever again, the letters he carried were only ten ounces but probably felt like a 1000 pounds. The morning after Ted was shot, Cross-burned his letters and even though he knew that he would always remember Martha, it meant a passage a lifting of the burden. No more wanting at night, no more wishing he was with her, no more letting his men die because of his love. He decided that he would become straighter, harder, a real leader even if his men didn't like it. He would move on to the next village and after that the next until his tour was up and never again did he want to lose another man.

Throughout the story the burden these men carried is explained, weather it was symbolically or literally it was a hardship. O'Brien does a very good job making it understood that "The Things They Carried" was not only objects but also emotions and memories. Life was hard but that was the new world these men entered and unless you were willing to shoot your self in the foot, it was the world that you would be in until the end, no passing go, just the hard fact that they were at war without a meaning, fighting people they didn't know, carrying things they didn't need. It was war.