This chapter Ghost Soldiers provided a very interesting perspective on one of the most iconic war stories: getting shot. And Tim O’Brien presented us with two different versions of the story, the first didn’t seem so bad, in fact in a perverse way it sounded kinda nice. He was joking with Rat throughout it and in the end he gets 26 days of R&R. On the flip side the second presented the horror story version of it, where everything that could wrong did go wrong. Here he almost loses his butt, the medic completely fails at his job, and the brotherhood that he had with his comrades collapses.
Overall these stories took me for an emotional joyride, they are just too good to be true. And that reminded me that they probably aren’t… Throughout the book Tim O’Brien has announced that the stories don’t have to be and probably shouldn’t be factually accurate. There are several signs of this in the first story. The way he “falls” into Rat Kiley’s arms, the references to the Gene Autry movies, the way it never even hurts, it's all just too surreal, it seems more like how someone fantasize about getting shot rather than someone who was actually shot.
On the flipside there is the absolutely dreadful experience of being shot in the butt and then receiving ‘treatment from Bobby Jorgenson. Yet this one seemed more factual to me, it was grittier and more detailed, and as a result felt significantly more realistic. Still, I question his portrayal of Bobby Jorgenson. This chapter frames him as the most incompetent medic to ever wear a U.S military uniform, he forgets to treat for shock, fails to patch the wound correctly, and straight up fails to even go treat him until 10 minutes after he is shot. The portrayal is so negative that it must be biased. Clearly, Tim has a serious revenge complex going on here, just look at the ‘prank’ that occurs later, and I think that this desire for revenge has tainted his memory of what happened. Overall, while I doubt the specifics of the stories in this chapter, I am fairly confident that these are based on events that happened to Tim or someone else in his unit.
The contrast between the two stories also made me question the validity of them. O'Brien paints the perfect and the worst experiences of getting shot. As for his portrayal of Jorgenson, I agree that he's probably seeing red but I still sympathize more with O'Brien. Not only did he have to lay in pain for several minutes, his wound got infected and served as eternal humiliation. To add insult to injury, the guy that failed to prevent it ends up taking his place in Alpha Company. In my opinion, Jorgenson got off way too easy for his incompetence.
ReplyDeleteI myself doubt the specifics in the story as well. I read the vignette at the beginning in a similar way to the way you read it. He does an excellent job at contrasting the two. I happen to believe that he exaggerated both sides of the story as to emphasize both the good and the bad. I choose to think that when he was writing this essay he might have known that he was exaggerating but in the heat of the moment, it was probably how he felt. Personally, even though it's fustrating that we as readers are always unsure of what is true or not, I can appreciate what he did in terms of writing style.
ReplyDeleteI found the first story to be an idealistic version of being shot. The first story seems unrealistic that Tim would fall into the medics arms. What are the chances that someone would be shot and fall directly into the medics arms.
ReplyDeleteI disagree that Tim O'Brien makes Bobby Jorgenson out to be totally concomitant. Yes is the first seen with Bobby Jorgenson he does a lot wrong and almost allows Tim to die. But it is not simple idiocy and incompetence that causes him to make these mistakes, but instead fear. Tim describes him as shaking and being too scared to come help him. And later in the chapter Bobby tells Tim that it was his first day and that he was just totally freaked out. I don't think this is contrary to your point, but I think it's an interesting distinction. I liked your point that this story was basically too good to be true, and that Tim landing in Rat's arms was just too perfect.
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