Characters
I was the young girl who came over to see her boyfriend and eventually fell in love with Vietnam and became one with the land.
Mary Anne Bell
I snuck my girlfriend into Vietnam. She ended up leaving me for the Green Berets.
Mark Fossie
O’Brien would most likely say to readers who want to know which of the events or people in the book are actually real....
You have missed the point of the book.
This soldier blows away the water buffalo.
Rat Kiley
This is the best description of Mary Anne Belle’s transformation.
She became one with the land and felt like she was meant to be a Greenie.
I offered Tim $200 and the chance to escape to Canada when we went fishing on my boat.
Elroy Berdahl
I wore my ex-girlfriend’s pantyhose on my neck as a good luck charm. They worked, too!
Henry Dobbins
Tim O’Brien describes Elroy Berdahl as the person who saved his life because...
He gave him the space and time he needed to think about the war, the draft, and his true feelings all without ever saying a word about dodging the draft or the war.
Ted Lavender carries with him:
Tranquilizers and marijuana
This is the most important message about the story of Mary Anne.
The story shows that war changes everyone.
I played volleyball at Mount Sebastian and wrote letter to Jimmy.
Martha
I wore a necklace of tongues.
Mary Anne Bell
When Tim O’Brien says “I was a coward. I went to war," he means:
He didn’t stand up for what he truly believed in.
In the chapter “On Rainy River,” O’Brien does this ffor his summer job:
Declotter
The narrative in this story is
In the first person by a character within the story and in the third person by an all-knowing narrator.
I carried around a New Testament Bible and lost my life in the sewage field.
Kiowa
My real name is Bob. I was the platoon’s first medic.
Rat Kiley
This is most important to Tim O’Brien.
Emotional truth
The men talk to the dead bodies and play games with them because...
They want to lighten up the situation and make death seem less real.
Several of the men hang onto things from women back in the states who they aren’t even in a relationship with anymore because...
It gives them hope.
It gives them a sense of home.
It reminds them they have something to return home to.
I was killed while playing a game of catch with a grenade. Tim had to pick pieces of me out of a tree.
Curt Lemon
I refused to forgive Jimmy Cross for Kiowa’s death because he should’ve known better.
Mitchell Sanders
This is how O’Brien copes with his post traumatic stress from the war.
Writing stories about the war
This person is responsible for Kiowa’s death.
The young soldier with the flashlight
These are characteristics of a true war story, according to O’Brien:
It embarrasses the listener.
It never seems to end.
It is difficult to separate what really happened from what seemed to happen.