Megan Mangione - TTTC_Love & Spin Activity
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Nov 24, 2024
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Chapters - “Love” and “Spin” Quote from O’Brien
: “ . . . and I didn’t meet any communists out there preaching Marxism, and Engels — you met poor people who were trying to stay alive and feed their families and themselves, and where they may have been indifferent 10 years before, they weren’t indifferent anymore, nor would anyone else be. It was the way to lose a war. Because you take people out of their houses and you move them. And big aggregates of people, and you boss them around, and you call all the shots, and you beat up on people, and you trash everything that could be trashed — all in the name of searching for the enemy. The consequences are you make enemies. You may kill a few Vietcong along the way, but you are making enemies — just imagine one baby being shot by accident — it’s got a mother and a father and an uncle
and aunt and friends and brothers and sisters — and they may have been indifferent before that baby died, but they’re not indifferent anymore and nor would you or anyone else.” (
Interview with PBS
) Essential Terminology
: Batangan Peninsula – A heavily mined area in Vietnam; was a Vietcong stronghold
USO – United Service Organization – organization that aimed at raising the troop’s morale through entertainment
GI – “Government Issue” – a soldier Poppa-san – Slang for an elderly Vietnamese man
AWOL – Absent without Leave (gone without official permission)
Paddy – A rice field
Motifs/Major Ideas and Objects
: Photographs, Memories, Talismans and Superstition, Nature Guiding Questions
: 1) Examine the titles of these two chapters. How do the titles connect to the content? 2) These two chapters provide time shifts. We see Jimmy Cross and O’Brien not as young soldiers but now as older men reflecting on their experiences. What is the effect of this time shift? 3) Many of the chapters connect. The story is not a simple linear plot, but it bounces around. Each chapter provides another layer and angle to various stories embedded within the novel. How do “The Things They Carried,” “Love,” and “Spin” connect and offer different layers and angles to the story? 4) Read the quote above by O’Brien. How do details ring true in his stories? 5) How has the Vietnam War still stuck with Jimmy Cross and Tim O’Brien? 6) In “Spin,” O’Brien details inhumane actions of some of the soldiers. What are some of these actions? What might O’Brien’s purpose be in detailing these events? 7) How does O’Brien dispel some romantic views of war in these two chapters? 8) Examine each character. How do they differ? In what ways do they adapt to or try to cope with their situations? Some to consider: Azar, Ted Lavender, Kiowa, Jimmy Cross. 9) Examine tone. What is O’Brien’s tone when reflecting on
the war in “Love” and detailing the soldiers’ burdens in “The Things They Carried”? How might these different tones connect to O’Brien’s purpose in each of these chapters? 10) O’Brien includes episodes where the war wasn’t always the “bad stuff.” What purpose does
O’Brien’s outlining of more humorous or lighthearted events serve? 11) O’Brien devotes time to examining how his memory functions when thinking back on the war.
Review his descriptions of memory. Should we doubt his recollections? 12) What is the function of stories according to O’Brien? 13) Examine how the violence of the war is juxtaposed with peace and/or the beauty of nature. Find
examples of this juxtaposition and consider how they contribute to one or more of O’Brien’s purposes. Use the table below to help organize your examples.
Beauty/Peace Violence/Brutality
Effect of these contrasts/juxtapositions
“Love” and “Spin” Steps: 1) In groups, select three questions you would like to discuss. 2) Individually, write a response to each question. Try to point to
specific examples in the text when writing your response. 3) When finished, discuss in groups. Afterwards, we will discuss as a class. Question Number: _
12
__ Response 1: According to Tim O’Brien Stories are for eternity. Even if something happened
really long ago if you remember it, it makes it seem like it just happened yesterday. He says that
the memories that are forgotten leave behind stories to be told. He also says that remembering
the memories can also lead to a story. By this I mean when you remember something that
happened either earlier in your day, or earlier in your life you would tell people about what
happened. Doing this is telling them a story about your day. Question Number: _
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__ Response 2: The vietnam war caused many people to have different trama when it comes to the
war. They lost their people and their youth. O’Brien writes about everything that happened and
what his experience with war was. Jimmy Cross still reminisces about what happened to Ted
Lavender and still drank years after it happened. He also blamed and still blames himself for
what happened to Lavender. They spent a lot of their youth fighting in a war and killing people
while now we spend our time playing war video games for fun. Question Number: _
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__ Response 3: Some of the inhumane things that some of the soldiers did are when Azar strapped
Lavender's orphan puppy to a Claymore antipersonnel mine and squeezed the firing device then
blowing up the puppy. I think This was incorporated in the book for two reasons. One to show
that they really were just kids and kids do stupid and disgusting things, and two to show how
war can make some people numb to certain things.
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