Tim O' Brien

"How to Tell a True War Story" by Tim O' Brien is a story about how to tell if someone is telling the truth in a war story. O'Brien states, " A true war story is never moral.It does not instruct, nor encourage virtue, nor suggest models of proper human behavior, nor restrain the men from doing things they have always done". I thought this line was very important to the story because it sounded truthful and that's what the title is about. He says that a true war story does not suggest models of proper human behavior. I thought that was true because i have never been to war and I'm sure a majority of readers have not been either so we would agree that there is not proper human behavior in war because there is a lot of stuff that they do that we would never do. Thus we cant even pinpoint what they do there we can only assume by what we hear about "fighting in war" or stories that friends or family have told us about their experience in war but then again, O'Brien suggests that half of what is being told isn't true so do we truly know what happens in war. I also thought the example of Lemon was very true when he speaks upon watching a guy die it is very hard because you look away and look back and then look away again and the picture gets jumbled in your mind and you miss a lot of what actually happened. O'Brien states, "...a true war story is never about war...its about love and memory.Its about sorrow.It's about sisters who never write back and people who never listen". Thus the truth in the story was about the pain Bob Kiley felt over Lemon's death and the pain he felt that Lemon's sister never wrote back.