Brian Diaz
4-5-17
English H
Ms. Schaller A literary device Tim O'Brien uses in the chapter, the man I killed, is Juxtaposition/Imagery. Tim O'Brien states, "Along the trail were small blue flowers shaped like bells. The young man's head was wrenched sideways, not quite facing the flowers, and even in the shade a single blade of sunlight sparkled against the buckle of his ammunition belt. (Page 128). O'Brien uses Juxtaposition/Imagery to show the beauty out of something that is dark and unimaginable. He shows us both parts of death. One being beautiful with flowers and sunshine. The other dark, evil, and the sense of war. This is Tim's first time killing in the war. He feels so ashamed and distraught that he begins to imagine how the boy's life would have been if he did not kill him. Kiowa as his …show more content…
And bones. Stack of bones-all kinds" (Page 110). This showed the soldiers more than just a dead animal. But the stink of the kill. After all, this is war. Killing is a habit, in these chapters. Death becomes a lifestyle for these poor soldiers. In the chapter, ambush, we can see that the point of view comes through the eyes of an American soldier. This chapter represents the life of an American in the unimaginable conditions soldiers went through in the Vietnam war. A literary device O'Brien uses is characterization. O'Brien states, "He had stopped praying; instead, now, he waited. And as he waited, in his final year at the university, he fell in love with a classmate, a girl of seventeen, who one day told him his wrists were like the wrists of a child, so small and delicate, and who admired his narrow waist and the cowlick that rose up like a bird's tall at the back of his head. She liked his quiet manner; she laughed at his freckles and bony legs. One evening, perhaps, they exchanged gold ring. (128-129) We see how Tim has imagined this boy's life. O'Brien's guilt has him so fixated on the life of his victim that