This excellent selection of war-time stories is
interesting in the way that the major symbols that are used are actually people rather
than objects. Consider, for example the Vietnamese man that O'Brien thinks he killed in
"The Man I Killed." It is clear that this soldier serves as a symbol of humanity's guilt
concerning the atrocities of war. Consider how in this story this man is given an
imagined past and how the tale is written in the third person (unlike nearly all the
other tales in this collection) so as to distance the author from the crime. In
particular, the narrative focuses on the star-shaped hole that is in the place of the
soldier's eye:
He was a slim, dead, almost dainty young man of
about twenty. He lay with one leg bent beneath him, his haw in his throat, his face
neither expressive nor inexpressive. One eye was shut. The other was a star-shaped
hole.
The way that this
description is refered to again and again throughout this tale and the fantasies that
the author constructs about this anonymous soldier's life, which are markedly similar to
the author's own life in some respects, reveals the trememndous guilt that the author
feels, even though the narrative never directly addresses his own feelings of
remorse.
You might like to consider how other characters
are important symbols, such as Kathleen and Linda. I hope this helps and good
luck!
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