The Things They Carried,By Tim O'Brien

Mary Dennis

• “A good piece of fiction, in my view, does not offer solutions. Good stories deal with our moral struggles, our uncertainties, our dreams, our blunders, our contradictions, our endless quest for understanding. Good stories do not resolve the mysteries of the human spirit but rather describe and expand up on those mysteries." T.O.

• Tim O’Brien’s style is as chaotic as the 1960s era he grew up in…it makes us question and think.

The 60’s started with Johnny Cash and ended with Woodstock

The Loss of JFK and MLK

The Space race was on!

"A lie, sometimes, can be truer than the truth, which is why fiction gets written." — Tim O'Brien

"I'll picture Rat Kiley face, his grief, and I'll

think, You dumb cooze. Because she wasn't

listening. It wasn't a war story. It was a love story.

" — Tim O'Brien (

The Things They Carried)

As a storyteller O’Brien has done his

job…

Out of his fiction….comes facts…

And understanding… about a chaotic era of social disorder

and a war clouded with confusion.