The Things They Carried

In the story “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien, O’Brien uses many different conventions to enhance the stories themes and ideas. Two of these conventions include the use of parallel structure and the act of repetition.

O’Brien uses parallel structure throughout the story, moving between the things the men carried, the outside life of the soldiers, and then moving to the dialogue between the soldiers. The parallel structure emphasizes the story’s main theme, the physical and emotional burdens that each soldier has going into this war and trying to survive in this war. The parallel structure focuses on the physical garments the men must carry as well as the emotional strain that each man carries. The use of repetition also aids in the emphasis of the theme of physical and emotional burden. It seems redundant at first, but as the story progresses, O’Brien is making a statement by using the same format for every paragraph. The burdens the men carry are like no other. They must carry weapons and tools in preparation for any kind of scenario. This is physical weight on their bodies to the point of almost torture and inhumane. The repetition and parallel structure also exists for the emotional constraints that the men have to carry. Lieutenant Cross constantly faces the burden of being rejected by the woman he loves. This emotional constraint hampers his ability to lead his men into battle and he pays for this with the death of Ted Lavender. He blames his emotional burden for the death of Ted Lavender and is never able to overcome this burden.