Secondary Sources

These sources are ways of enriching your understanding of the texts we'll be reading this semester.  Some are directly related to the works: some only tangentially, but in all cases, you need to begin first with an appreciation of the play, poem, or story on your own.

Note: many (most) of the readings are are in PDF format.  You may (if it's not already installed on your computer) have to download and install the FREE (that's free) reader.  Click here to be directed to the Adobe website page which contains the reader (did I mention it was free?). 

If you're on a dial-up connection, PDF files will take a while to download, but once they appear on your screen, you can save them to your own computer for later access by clicking on File and following the prompts or by clicking on the disk icon.

Sources for Things They Carried
Interview with Tim O'Brien (South Carolina Review) PDF format
Interview with Tim O'Brien (Naperstack) PDF format
Steven Kaplan "The Undying Uncertainty of the Narrator" PDF format
Catherine Calloway "Metafiction in The Things They Carried" PDF format
John Timmerman "Tim O'Brien and the Art of the True War Story" PDF format
Marian Wesley "Truth and Fiction in Tim O'Briens If I Die in a Combat Zone and The Things They Carried" PDF format


In the News" for Things They Carried
Here you'll find essays from newspapers and magazines that reflect, sometimes obliquely, sometimes directly, on the themes and ideas of the novel.
Bono's New Casualty: Saving Private Ryan