The Things They Carried Stories 6 - 11

Friends

Lee and Dave developed a close friendship after the incident with the knife. They learned to trust one another and even made a contract that if one of them ever became wheelchair-bound, the other would end the wounded man’s life. Later on, Lee Strunk lost his leg after stepping on a mortar, while drifting in and out of consciousness, he kept telling Dave not to kill him. A few weeks after Lee was extracted from the battlefield, the company discovered that Lee had passed away, and Dave Jensen felt like a great burden had been lifted from him. 

How To Tell a True War Story

The narrator talks about the nature of a true war story, which never really has a true moral or a lesson. He illustrates what he means by talking about the time that Rat Kiley had written to the sister of his dead comrade, Curt Lemon. He spent several days writing the letter, talking about all the reasons why Curt Lemon was an amazing soldier and his closest friend. He cried writing the letter, but Lemon’s sister never wrote back. Rat Kiley called her a “dumb Cooze.” The narrator goes further and says that often the simple facts of a war story were untrue while the crazy facts were always true.

Sanders told Tim a crazy story about a group of soldiers that were sent into the mountains of Vietnam for a listening mission. Their objective was to listen for and report enemy troop movements, which required them to remain extremely quiet. They camped on top of a mountain, the nights were the most difficult since the fog and clouds were so thick that they couldn’t discern anything. The soldiers began to hear strange music emanating from the hills, and it only grew in strength. They couldn’t laugh it off, and couldn’t report it either. Night after night, the men heard music and strange noises, and it nearly drove them mad. They couldn’t stand any more of it and requested fire support. The artillery and air force bombed the co-ordinates, but the music never stopped. The men returned to their base, but they offered no explanation when they were asked by their superiors about what had led them to call for the air strike. Sanders swore the story was true even though he had made up some facts about the kind of music the men had heard.

Curt Lemon was killed while Rat Kiley and he were playing a childish game under the shade of some large trees. Curt was blown into pieces and his remains were stuck to a tree. They had to retrieve his viscera from the tree. Afterward, the company found an abandoned baby buffalo. They led it with them to their camp, where Rat Kiley tried to feed it some rations. The creature refused them, and Rat Kiley set about killing the calf slowly. He shot off its mouth, shot it in the knee, fired several shots into its flank, and all but tore off the tail. He finally shot the creature in the throat and went off crying while the rest of the company examined the yet-alive baby cow.

An old woman approached Tim after he had read that story and told him that she felt sorry for the baby cow. Tim called her a “dumb Cooze,” in his mind. He goes on to say that none of it is true, and if it is, it didn’t happen in the mountains.

The Dentist

Tim remembers that Curt Lemon wasn’t an extremely impressive guy. He was often full of bravado and did some ridiculous things which included going trick or treating nearly naked in a Vietnamese village. He recalls that Curt Lemon had an odd fear of dentists. The company was assigned a dentist, and Curt Lemon had been visibly terrified of the dentist. He explained that he experienced a couple of terrible incidents with the dentists in high school and nothing in the world would impel him to return. In the end, Curt Lemon went into the tent when his name was called but he fainted just as soon as the dentist touched him. Curt became very embarrassed afterward, he refused to speak to anyone and they heard him cursing himself. That night, he woke the dentist in the middle of the night claiming a hurting tooth. The dentist took out a tooth, and Curt Lemon was back to being himself.

Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong

Rat Kiley was known for exaggeration but he repeatedly claimed that the story he had told them was all true. He told them a unique tale about an officer who had brought his girlfriend to Vietnam. Kiley was working with a medical detachment at the time, and although it was bloody work, the medics were comfortable and safe at their compound. They had a group of Green Berets that sometimes used the compound as a base of operations. The officers jokingly talked about getting some women in the base one evening, and one officer took a particular interest in the idea. A few weeks later, Marry Anne, Mark Fossie’s girlfriend arrived with a supply helicopter. Fossie explained that organizing the trip hadn’t been all that complicated, and his girlfriend had felt no hesitation. Everyone was jealous of Fossie, while Marry Anne seemed eager to learn more about the operations and the business of soldiering. She learned how to use an assault rifle quite well and even insisted on visiting one of the neighboring Vietnamese villages.

Fossie came to wake Rat Kiley in the middle of the night, he claimed that Mary Anne hadn’t come to bed and he was afraid that she was sleeping with someone. They searched the whole camp, but they never found her. She returned the following morning among the Green Berets, with whom she had gone on Ambush. She stayed in the camp for three weeks afterward, and although things between Fossie and her seemed all right on the surface, there was an odd forced nature to them. Fossie began to make preparations for her departure, but she disappeared with the Green Berets. She reappeared much later, and Kiley accompanied Fossie when he entered the shack where the Green Berets were staying. There was odd music coming out of the building, and it was accompanied by singing that sounded like Mary Anne. They found her wearing a necklace of human tongues and singing before the decapitated head of a black leopard. She told him that she had found something in the forests and she intended to stay. Fossie was discharged from the forces a few weeks later, while Mary Anne was said to have disappeared into the forest while she was out with the Green Berets.

Stockings

Henry Dobbins had this strange talisman, the stockings of his girlfriend. He wore them around his neck and often slept with them right against his face. The others made fun of him but they acknowledged that Henry Dobbins had never gotten injured and he had continued to wear the stockings even after his girlfriend broke up with him. 

Church

The company briefly set up their camp in an old Pagoda, which was being cared for by a couple of really old monks. The monks were very kind to the soldiers, they brought them water, set up a nice chair for the lieutenant, and spent a lot of time helping Henry Dobbins. After spending a little time with the monks, Henry Dobbins spoke with Kiowa about the aspirations he had once had for being a minister. He wasn’t any good at interpreting the scriptures but he always liked the part about being nice to people. He gave the monks a couple of cans of peaches and said that all they could do was treat people with decency. 

Analysis

The novel won acclaim for its raw examination of a soldier’s experience of the controversial Vietnam War, but also because of its literary exploration. In some of the stories, the narrator examines the nature of war stories, the qualities that differentiate a true war story from a fake one, and identifies the untrue aspects of a real war story. The Sweetheart of Song Tra Bong elucidates that the simple facts of a real war story are almost always untrue, but the feeling that is being communicated is certainly true. He believes that a true war story causes you to feel its authenticity in your stomach, which is why Rat Kiley exaggerated the facts of his story because he wished to communicate the feeling through the story rather than the bare facts. He also discusses the role of the narrator in telling a story as Norman Bowker criticizes Rat Kiley for repeatedly halting the story with clarifications rather than allowing the listener to become immersed in the story. The narrator defends Rat Kiley as he explains that his method allowed the narrator to ensure that the meaning is being communicated to the audience.