Jimmy Cross Vietnam War

Words: 2452
Pages: 10
Open Document
The Vietnam War was a long and expensive conflict in which the United States

attempted, yet ultimately failed to prevent the spread of communism to South Vietnam from the communist country North Vietnam. The United State’s involvement in the war began in 1955 and their efforts fully ceased in 1975. The war had a devastating affect on the country’s population; an estimated two million Vietnamese died during the Vietnam War. The conflict in Vietnam was far less devastating to the American militia, claiming the lives of fifty eight thousand and wounding two hundred thousand United States soldiers. The Vietnam War was the most unpopular war with American citizens. One of the contributing factors was media; with media coverage in Vietnam, Americans …show more content…
This narration gives the reader a sensual understanding of what situations would arise in the midsts of war and how a man would cope with the emotions and stress caused by violence. Jimmy Cross expresses his fears through his obsessional unrequited love with a woman named Martha. He confides in his memories of her to console him while in combat. The memories of Martha help Jimmy cope with the war. In the article, “Stressing and Coping Mechanisms”, psychologists Richard Lazarus and Susan Folkman scientifically defined coping as, “the sum of cognitive and behavioural efforts, which are constantly changing, that aim to handle particular demands, whether internal or external, that are viewed as taxing or demanding.”(Sincero). The psychological definition of coping is an aspect directly observed through Jimmy Cross. Martha is the ‘behavioral effort’ to handle the internal mental trauma of the war. The first few sentences into the story, the reader experiences an immediate insight to Jimmy Cross’ personality. The quote states: “In the late afternoon, after a day's March he would dig his foxhole, wash his hands under a canteen, unwrap the letters, hold them with the tips of his fingers, and spend the last hours of night pretending.”(O’Brien, 366). These few sentences display the level of affection that Jimmy has for Martha. He uses the most proper form of care that he can to handle the letters he receives from her. What the reader understands after learning of Jimmy Cross’ behavior is that ’pretending’ represents a mental escape. As the story progresses, the reader is able to see more instances of him fading in and out of reality. During one of his daydreams, Jimmy Cross admits to one of his unhealthy habits: “On occasion he would yell at his men to spread out the column, to keep their
Show More

Related Documents: Jimmy Cross Vietnam War

Jimmy Cross In Tim O Brien's The Things They Carried

not in his work will often not do a good job. Lt. Jimmy Cross cares more about going home than leading his troops in battle. He makes risky decisions that have big consequences. He does not want the responsibility of leading troops in battle so he does not care enough to do a proper job. In The Things They Carried, Jimmy Cross is an ineffective leader as he puts his men in danger and is not well-prepared or focused. Lt. Jimmy Cross is out in the war zone, yet all he wants to do is be back in America…

Words 786 - Pages 4

Essay about Alex Rodriguez

The Affect of the War No matter what type of confrontation one may be engaged in, the results are usually experiences that will affect the person involved. In the situations that the characters of Tim O’Brien’s post-modern war novel, The Things They Carried, many characters are exposed to staining experiences during their time serving in the Vietnam War that alter their lives. With any war there are bound to be gruesome sights that may cause one to get queasy, but nothing compares to the hardships…

Words 702 - Pages 3

All Quiet On The Western Front Critical Analysis

on the Western Front and Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried vividly explain the horrors of war. Although the soldiers in World War I and the Vietnam War fought on very different battlefields, the strategies in which they use to cope with death and destruction are profoundly similar. In both All Quiet on the Western Front and The Things They Carried soldiers experience guilt because they survived the war but their comrades died on the battlefield. Paul experiences guilt throughout the entire story…

Words 842 - Pages 4

TTTC Literary Analysis: The Things They Carried By Tim O Brien

The Vietnam War was a conflict between the communist regime of North Vietnam against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States from 1959 to 1975. Tim O’Brien, an American writer and a soldier at Vietnam, wrote the novel The Things They Carried. He writes about all of his experiences and stories in the battlefield. Moreover, this book how courage, cowardice, love, and hate can exist side by side within the soldiers and these are the things that keep the soldiers go on in the war. First…

Words 918 - Pages 4

TTC Socratic Seminar Essay

Marc Margolis Mr. Williams 11 Honors 26 May 2015 Beyond Vietnam Open Ended Question: How do the other soldiers in the Alpha Company react to the death of Ted Lavender and are their reaction a water shed example to the dangers of becoming overly attached to ones comrades in war? The two people most affected by the death of Ted Lavender are Kiowa and Jimmy Cross. Jimmy and Kiowa both contain unremitting guilt for the death of their fallen comrade. Kiowa for a while could not stop talking about the…

Words 466 - Pages 2

Essay On Women In Tim O Brien's The Things They Carried

The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, women were not an essential part of fighting in the Vietnam War. While having a mainly man based army, one would assume there were very minimal distractions amongst the soldiers when it came to women. Linda and Martha are just two of the five women featured throughout The Things They Carried. In O’Brien’s case, the woman in his story kept him alive. But the woman in Jimmy Crosses case leads to a death. These two women soon prove that they don’t have to be present…

Words 1041 - Pages 5

Jimmy Cross In The Things They Carried

The Conflict of First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross in "The Things They Carried" There is a substantial amount of natural conflict in the short story "The Things They Carried", as it is set on the battlefields of Vietnam, but I wanted to focus on the internal conflict that Jimmy Cross experiences. First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross was in love. Her name was Martha, and although she was Jimmy's pen pal during the war, it was clear that she did not reciprocate Jimmy's love for her. Here is a quote from the…

Words 462 - Pages 2

Women In Tim O Brien's The Things They Carried

lot of women that appear in the book, but there is quite a few that played an important role. They may not seem to mean as much to us, but the key roles they play for the men in war give us a new kind of understanding. They are a sense of home for the soldiers. Mary Anne Bell was a girl from Cleveland who came to Vietnam to be with her boyfriend, Mark Fossie. She was an attractive girl with a bubbly personality and a happy smile. Everyone likes her as she is really friendly and outgoing. “At the…

Words 597 - Pages 3

The Things They Carried Essay

O’Brien reflects on his experience in the Vietnam War. He also tells the reader about the people that were there with him. In the novel, the Marxist theory is very relevant. Lieutenant Jimmy Cross was very pre-occupied during the war with his girlfriend Martha. All he did was think about her and the letters she sent him. He would put his men at risk because he wasn’t following proper safety rules. The death of Ted Lavender hit Lieutenant Cross hard because it happened at a time when he…

Words 778 - Pages 4

Tim O Brien's How To Tell A True War Story

In Tim O’Brien’s “How to Tell a True War Story” there are multiple themes throughout the story. Theme is a repeated idea that is incorporated throughout a literary work. A theme is a thought or idea the author presents to the reader that may be deep or difficult to understand. Generally, a theme has to be extracted from the reader while they explore the passages of a work. While reading “How to Tell a True War Story” the reader will pick up on the multiple themes such as sanity and morals, fear of…

Words 911 - Pages 4