In Slaughterhouse Five, Billy Pilgrim has clear issues. As we later diagnosed him in class, he had a strong case of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Whenever memories triggered feelings of war, he would find comfort through certain coping mechanisms. He would often times time travel or find comfort through the Tralfamadorians.
Thus far in Going After Cacciato, O'Brien presents two characters that struck me. Though the do not have PTSD as Pilgrim has, they both find different ways of coping with their anxiety. The first and obvious one is Cacciato himself. He had issues with the military and its presence in Vietnam. To deal with that discontent, he left and headed towards Paris. That was his way of coping with the rigors of war. Next is Paul Berlin. One of the ways that he deals with war is demonstrated on page 10- "Paul Berlin sat alone playing solitaire in the style of Las Vegas. Pretending ways of spending his earnings. Travel, expensive hotels, tips for everyone. Wine and song on white terraces, fountains blowing colored water. Pretending was his best trick for forgetting the war." It's pretty obvious from that quote how Paul Berlin occupies his mind in order to stay stable during the war.
The two points I'm trying to reach here are as follows: 1) War is the most physically and mentally damaging thing one can put him or herself through. We have seen time and time again that no matter how hard you try, there is no coming back from war the same. The experiences permanently change you- it's inevitable. You just have to hope that you are fighting for something greater than yourself and stick to that belief. 2) Being able to read these novels through the eyes of two men that were there and experienced the war is great. Who better to tell the terrors of war than those who lived the terrors?
9 comments:
Clearly there's a trend in escaping physical stress through mental distraction. i'm a runner; i understand this. When running, the best thing to think about is... not running.
Oddly enough, mental stress makes me want to blow off steam by working out. i'm not sure how that works but there must be some connection.
The problem with war, i suppose, is that's constant mental AND physical stress. So what can someone do to relieve all of that?
I like your analysis of the different characters of Slaughterhouse and Going After Cacciato. This is definitely the best way to understand the terrors and stresses of war: through the eyes of the people who have experienced it first-hand. I think both main characters of their respective stories have some problem-- as you said, war changes you, always. I think we just haven't seen it with Paul Berlin yet, since he is still "in the war," while Billy Pilgrim is out, looking back in. But the different perspective definitely harness your point, that war changes you no matter what, and coping mechanisms are ways to escape the present or relive the past in order to understand the present or future.
I think we can broaden you thesis by including the entire squad. There way of coping with the war is very similar to that of Cacciato, they leave. As we discussed in class, there are times when they are within seeing distance of the deserter and make no real effort to catch him. They're as fed up with the war as Cacciato was and they desert just like he did, only they disguise it as a mission.
While I agree that war is probably the most mentally damaging thing a person can partake in, I believe that as technology has advanced the mental and physical toll on soldiers has decreased. Today many soldiers do not witness the same hardships that soldiers faced who fought in WWII or the Civil War. In previous wars, where death counts were much higher, the mental toll on a soldier would be greater because a soldier that survived the war would have known many fellow soldiers who had died. While this can still be the case today, the odds are not favorable due to the low death counts.
JaPaulie, I think your points are really well stated. Like you say, I think these works should be treasured because these stories come from primary sources; actual people who fought in these wars they write about.
Your statement that war will change a person is very true. No matter how much Paul Berlin plays solitaire to forget the war, it will be burned into him forever. Ultimately, both O'Brien and Vonnegut have changed from war, and they were so moved that they even wrote novels documenting their thoughts on the the particular concept. Great post.
I really think the two ideas you present to conclude your post really hammer home your points. Obviously war is something that will forever change the people who fight in it and will forever change history. This is a concrete fact. I think that if we are to understand what has happened to the soldiers who have fought, the best way is to listen to them talk about it. These two points are very important for our perception of wars and the people fighting them and we must be able to sympathize with the people returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan today.
I think writing about war is a very difficult and challenging task to accomplish. It is difficult to capture the psycological tolls and tortures of war through words and illusions, but Going After Cacciato makes a valiant effort in forcing the reader to develop a sense of the actual war. Many people who survive wars come back as different individuals based on the life altering experiences they face. Literature on war creates a sense of what war is like, but can never truly capture the emotions of fear and terror that war ignites in people. This book gives us insight into the world these men live in and now belong.
I agree, and I think it's a good thing that war changes people (even if its for the worst) in the long term. The why is because the more horrific people know war to be, the less likely it will occur easily the next time.
I think most of all the two books are powerful stories about the power the mind has during and after the war. The people who believe wholeheartedly that the people they are killing deserve it, might actually not have any issues. Funnily enough, it is when people of their own batallion, platoon, or troop are killed, that they are thrusted into a world previously uknown.
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