A Study Of The Women Figures In Tim O’Brien’s War Fiction

Tim O’Brien is a famous American writer who mainly writes about the Vietnam War.His major works include If I Die in a Combat Zone,Box Me Up and Ship Me Home(1973),Northern Lights(1975),Going After Cacciato(1978),The Nuclear Age(1985),The Things They Carried(1990),In the Lake of the Woods(1994),Tomcat in Love(1998),July,July(2002),and a few others.Going After Cacciato won him the American Book Award in1979.In 1968,Tim O’Brien was selected for the Army and sent to Vietnam,and this experience becomes the major topic of his novels.In the early 1970 s,Vietnam War literature,including poems,plays,novels and memoirs,describing the profound impact of the war on American society in every aspect,has become a popular topic for the literary studies in the U.S.As one of the most highly regarded men of letters writing about the Vietnam War,Tim O’Brien undoubtedly is the focus of criticism by scholars at home and abroad.For many people,war is exclusively for men,and war novels are created for men.However,people ignore the fact that there are women who go to war and women who experience physical and psychological trauma after the war.O’Brien’s novels are considered the pinnacle of the Vietnam War.Various female characters are found in his novels.Many scholars at home and abroad has studied O’Brien’s novels from the perspective of trauma theory,and has analyzed the inner world of those who participated in the war,experienced the war,and suffered psychological or physical trauma after the war.They pay little attention to the female characters in O’Brien’s novels.This thesis selects four novels of Tim O’Brien to explore how the“women as the Other” in July,July,The Things They Carried,Going After Cacciato and Tomcat in Love give out their voice.O’Brien’s women figures do not experience the war,but the physical and psychological trauma they suffer is just as painful as those who have experienced the war.In July,July,Dorothy’s life after the war is as painful as that of those who have experienced the Vietnam War.Spook Spinelli’s childhood is traumatized by the death of her twin sister,which results in her speech impediment.She experiences the physical trauma as experiencing the war.Treated as “the Other” outside the war,O’Brien’s women figures suffer as the men who have entered the war.The Things They Carried tells a story of soldiers marching to battle with heavy bags on their back.The inner activities of the male characters in the war are the focus of O’Brien’s literary imagination,but a few female characters like Martha and Mary Anne occupy the center place of these men.Martha has “lost for her words” and unable to express her inner feelings and desires,and is portrayed as a woman who does not care about war.Virginia Woolf is her favorite writer and she has the temperament of a poet like Woolf,which is read as women’s voiceless fight against war.Different from Martha,Mary Anne fights on the battlefield like a man,thought she is always on the edge of war.Fanatical about war,she eventually gets lost in the war,which echoes Martha’s voice against the war.Sarkin Aung Wan in Going After Cacciato is Vietnamese girl,but she is a wise woman,leading the male soldiers throughout their imaginative journey.On the way to Paris,she leads Paul Berlin all the way to Paris,and Paul Berlin finds the spiritual sustenance in Sarkin Aung Wan.Different form Sarkin Aung Wan,Lorna Sue in Tomcat in Love has suffered physical and emotional trauma since childhood caused by her father and brother,and in marriage she is mentally abused by her husband.Lorna Sue chooses to divorce to revolt against the male power to redeem herself.Like other women characters in O’Brien’s novel,they are not the main characters,but they show the unique power of women.