The Things They CarriedThe Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien is a captivating recitation where Tim O'Brien argues that all the stories in the entire book are actually true stories. Tim is the protagonist as well as the narrator of this particular story and it is the experiences he had regarding the war that drove him to write this story. The book provides a clear portrayal of the Vietnam War by showing the horrors of the war, but there have been different views regarding whether the book is anti-war or not. Accordingly, the aim of this article is to address this particular issue by addressing different points of view regarding whether the book is anti-war or not and this will be supported by specific episodes and topics as described in The Things They Carried (Kock 45). The book is clearly anti-war according to most supporters. The illusory version that the narrator, O'Brien, writes down about his imagination as a fighter in World War II depicts him not exclusively as a lover of peace. However, the hostility in Vietnam appeared wrong. The character doesn't have the audacity to escape to Canada. It is in this regard that The Things They Carried can be seen as a clear calamity whose main fault was the cause of its death by a rather sympathetic protagonist (Kock 115). It is in this line that all the horrors faced in the book are concentrated, such as killing, the loss of friends due to killing, the boredom interspersed with the terror resulting from this decision. The description of the tangible and intangible elements of the story is proof enough that this is an anti-war story. In the story the narrator faces the things that the soldiers carried and these were both tangible and int...... middle of paper ...... with them to avoid it based on the established reasons why it is not a good thing . The story The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien is in fact anti-war and any opposing view based on the description of the things soldiers carried during the war is not sufficient evidence that it promotes violence in any way (Smith 123) . Works CitedO'Brien, Tim. The things they carried. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1990. Kock, Phillip. The representation of violence and the daily life of the soldier in "Dispatches" by Michael Herr and "The Things they carry" by Tim O'Brien. Munich: GRIN Verlag, 2010.Smith, Patrick. Tim O'Brien: A Critical Companion. Westport: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2005. Kirszner, Laurie. & Mandel, Stephen. Narrative: read, react, write. Pauline, 1994.