Tim O’brien’s The Things They Carried:

In a paragraph answer whether O’Brien should assume responsibility for the death of the man described in the story, no matter whether or not O’Brien actually was the one who shot the man. Things to consider: be sure the paragraph is six to ten sentences; think about things such as the ethos, pathos, logos of O’Brien; think about whether O’Brien disambiguates his role in the war or complicates it; think about what claim he might be making for himself or others to consider in terms of the policy, facts, or value.
For a little extra context, there is not a single right answer. Basically, O’Brien is just telling us that storytelling is sometimes more truthful when the audience feels what the speaker/writer means for them to feel. His stories are not about relating what factually happened in the Vietnam War. His stories are about relating to the audience the things he felt, be it guilt, sadness, boredom, or pain. Therefore, in his short story “How to Tell a True War Story” the slow torture and destruction of a baby water buffalo by a nineteen-year-old soldier who just lost his best friend is meant to relate to the audience the excruciating guilt and loss of innocence that the young man feels. As an audience, it is a painful experience to read said events and the reader is pulled into similar guilt with the passing of each line that depicts the baby water buffalo’s torture.

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