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Tim O'Brien Biography

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April 27, 2014
Tim O’Brien: An American Novelist Tim O’brien is a great American novelist very known for many of his work. He has written many stories and novel’s which has made him very popular and won him many awards. Tim O’brien is very know for his books and stories but how does his past life influenced on much of his writing. Tim O’brien has gone through very tough times in his life which has greatly contributed to the ideas that are displayed in his work. The most important and most popular of his work was “the things they carried”. This was one of his most successful piece of work that skyrocketed his carrier as an author and writer, a successful story about the experience and atmosphere during World War II. Tim O’brien used his experience in combat to recreate a story of himself that goes into the smallest details about war and how it felt to be in it. Many of his other stories and novels that he has written as well talk about War and his experience in it. So what do we know exactly about him, the story that goes behind all his work. This is the story of a man who’s past has shaped his future. A man whose ideas shaped his life, his work, and his success. Tim O’Brien was born on October 1, 1946 in Austin Minessota. His father was was William Timothy O’Brien, a salesman. His mother was Ava Eleanor, a school teacher. Both of his parents served in the U.S Navy during the World War II. Tim O’Brien lived in Austin only to the age of nine. Later he moved to Worthington Minessota. He was enrolled at Macalester college in St. Paul, Minnessota. Here is where he developed his sense for leadership and activism. In the biography of Tim O’Brien by H.W Wilson it states that “he developed a reputation as an activist for social justice and improved education. He campaigned for the establishment of dorm libraries, the reform of the grading system, and, for twenty-one-year-olds, the privilege of bringing alcoholic beverages into the dorms; on behalf of female students, he advocated abolishing curfews and granting the privacy of closed doors when male guests visited during "open-house hours." Partly as a result of these efforts, he was elected student-body president in his senior year”. He became involved in many activities around campus and was very known for the things he did for the students. In 1996 Tim O’Brien obtained his Bachelors degree in political science. He was offered to continue his education and pursue his Masters degree at Harvard University. It was this moment which changed his life completely. Weeks after he received the letter to attend Harvard, he also received another letter. It just happened to be a draft notice to go fight in the Vietnam War. He could not believe his eyes. He went completely insane and was so frustrated that this has happened to him, a young and very talented person to be drafted to go to war. He was a pacifist and activist who fought not for war but for rights and fairness. The moment he saw the letter and realized his time has come to serve in the military, he simply started punching his typewriter. He was still in shock about that notice. During a interview he even confessed the truth behind what happen at the moment. He says “I went to my room in the basement and started pounding the typewriter. I did it all summer. It was the most terrible summer of my life, worse than being in the war. My conscience kept telling me not to go, but my whole upbringing told me I had to. That horrible summer made me a writer.” (H.W. Wilson 1995). Even he himself knew that his experience in the War will make him a great writer. It was on February of 1969 when Tim O’Brien arrived at Quang Ngai Province. This was the start for his whole career. This is the place where he will experience such dramatic events that will lead to his success. During the time that he spends in Vietnam, he sees people getting hurt, people getting murdered. Such as the massacre that happen on march of 1996. The whole world knew of what happened in a little town called My Lai. 115 American soldiers gunned downed any citizen at range including men, women, children, infants, even any animal life around. The death tol reached nearly 350 fatalities. This was one of the saddest stories ever witnessed by O’Brien. This was the reality of war, a battlefield without mercy. O’brien has said that he had not killed anyone during that incident but that the possibility of one his bullets hitting someone in trees still remains. Either way this was a horrific scene to the eyes of any human. Even if he did not kill anyone he still witnessed the murdered of many people and this could cause serious damage and a big sense of guilt. There is no way a man with such experience in war can overcome all this at once. He had to go through tough time to even be able to forget the horror he experienced during his time in Vietnam. “Until recently, O'Brien consistently told interviewers that he had suffered no lasting psychological damage and had had no difficulty readjusting to civilian life upon his return to the United States”. (H.W. Wilson) There is no doubt that once he returned from war, it would have become so strange for him to see life back how it was before he left. He would need time to readjust to society and to learn the ways of society. As H.W Wilson stated “In an attempt to distance himself from the Vietnam era, O'Brien focused on the transformation of a 1960s peace activist into a 1990s uranium speculator (the story opens in 1995) in his next novel, The Nuclear Age”.
So how exactly did Tim O’Brien became so succesfull and such a great author. Well to start off he was writing way before the war. His work was not as intense and passionate as it was after the war. He written couple short stories during his time in college when he was an activist. Those stories were never published for unknown reasons.
Other books:__________________________________________________________________ . His most successful work was the story of “The things they carried”. This story went from a short story in 1987 to a book in 1997, winning him many awards. The things they carried talks bout his experience during the war and the things this soldier carry with them, from guns to fear of expectation. Smoop editorial team knew that “One of the most important is that it's impossible to generalize about war. War sucks, but it doesn't always suck. It corrupts our soldiers, but it also makes them feel totally alive” (Shmoop 2008). We all know that this is true in some type of way. We are not all the same, some may like war, whereas others may love to kill. Phycologically thinking an average person with a right functional brain would be corrupted and tortured by the simple act of killing someone. I know I would never forgive myself if I was to commit such horrible act. As Tim himself said about his book The things they carried “is primarily about soldiers' emotional reactions to the Vietnam conflict: "grief, terror, love, longing,. . . shameful memories" and "the common secret of cowardice." "Men killed, and died, because they were embarrassed not to".

Work Cited
Shmoop Editorial Team. "The Things They Carried Summary." Shmoop.com. Shmoop University, Inc., 11 Nov. 2008. Web. 6 May 2014.

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