"A Temporary Matter" (Tone=>Theme)

As of "In The Field" of Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried, the motif of storytelling seems to be expanding its occurrences. In  “Speaking of Courage” we get the perspective of  Bowker on Kiowa’s death. In “Notes” we get O’Brien’s perspective. In “In the Field” we get the comments of the other company members. Both “Speaking of Courage” and “In the Field” are told in the third person. An omniscient point of view to be exact. This is effective because it gives many different points of view instead of focusing on one character’s account of Kiowa’s death. We can relive the situation not only from Norman Bowker’s point of view but also from that of Lieutenant Cross, Azar, and a young soldier whose name has not been revealed. The significance is that the reader eventually gets a gist of what the death did or what like to each character — but the story is different in each account in different ways. This does nothing but deepen O'Brien's presentation of storytelling because the different accounts told of Kiowa's death all seem genuine on an emotional level (morality and truth in war has little to do with accuracy). Because storytelling returns to the foreground of the narrative over and over further justifies that O'Brien fulfills the illustration of stories containing power because they allow tellers and listeners to confront the past together and share otherwise unknowable experiences.