Tim O'Brien

O'Brien's writing style is very blunt. He repeats things numerous times like saying stories are "True and at the same time untrue." He also really tries to explain what it meant to see Lemon step into the sunlight, with his distinct "half-step" and then sail up into the trees. O'Brien also uses cursing in his writing. He says that if you send a man to war when he comes back he'll talk dirty. You can tell O'Brien is a little bit messed up. Like the dumb cooze of a girl who didn't write back to Rat Kiley, he mentions her with distaste. One part inparticular stuck out to me..."The gore was horrible, and stays with me, but what wakes me up twenty yearslater is Norman Bowker singing “Lemon Tree” as we threw down the parts" - this is very visual. I can imagine him waking up by hearing this dude's voice in his head while he sleeps, like a siren coaxing him into consciousness. I also wonder about Mitchell Sanders and his story. O'Brien spends a lot of time talking about him and giving him the story telling spotlight. I think this really reflects some of the damage that O'Brien has. He seems to write through these other people almost and spends significant time on them. He repeats Lemon's death, Mitchells' story of the music, and Rat Kiley's letter and depression. He often bounces between subjects almost like a stream a conscious except that it is circular rather than linear. O'Brien's mind is sporadic. Much like his time spent in Nam it is jumbled into the real and the unreal, truth and lie. I think he is reliving a moment when he talks about waking his wife up at night and trying to tell her a story but forgetting the point at the end saying "Christ, what's the point" His stress is coming mostly from visuals that he saw and often relives. They are imprinted into his head and have no hope of ever leaving, burned into his pysch like a brand on a cow's hide.