Reader's Notebook #1 Sorrow of War

READER RESPONSE
Sorrow of War By: Bao Ninh

Reading this book was really hard, it was a challenge to keep turning the pages. In the beginning the author used some really profound imagery to get his message across. It was unbearable to read some of the scenes that he described in detail yet in so many ways it was artistic and beautiful. The narrator had obviously had gone through some of the horrific events of his lifetime. It is really crazy to me that he was willing to write about them.

“That autumn was sad, prolonged by rain. Orders came for food rations to be sharply reduced. Hungry, suffering successive bouts of malaria the troops became anemic and their bodies broke out in ulcers, showing through worn and torn clothing. They looked like lepers, not heroic forward scouts. Their faces looked moss-grown, hatched and sorrowful, without hope. It was a stinking life (16)”.

It amazes me that certain people are willing to talk about their traumatic past experiences to teach the younger generation something. That war affects the mind not only in a traumatic way but as a learning tool? Memories that soldiers are have, stay with them for a period of their lifetimes, if not all of their lifetime. Some of the excerpts from the poems read in class were meaningful and had a deeper meaning to them. I liked Thong's poem he read aloud, it gave the idea that soldiers are prisoners of war no matter how many years they fought because they're mind is still fine tuned to war and it’s terrifying experience.

I could not imagine the Vietnam War’s effect on so many young people. I remember I asked my sister's mother-in-law to come to one of my AJROTC competitions and she said that she couldn’t because of her involvement with anti-war protests in the 60's. This was in 2007 when I asked her to come to one of my competitions. Yet this woman felt compelled in her beliefs still after a couple decades. That made me think about the effects of this war and its toll that it took on so many people.

I look back on it and I look at images and photographs. There were so many people outraged at the fact that there were children dying overseas. There were people who were lying about their ages to fight for the country they believed in. The United States let boys die in a far off land some million miles away to be called a ‘hero’. It seems to me that the country took for granted at the time how many people actually gave their lives to fight a war that at the time did not make much sense to a great number of people.

This book was on dealing with the sorrow of war, that the Vietnam War brought and dealing with losing love. I don't think that I would be able to handle the thought of losing someone while being at war. It would bring me to pieces. Which leads me to believe that the narrator of this book was a strong willed individual to place himself at the very place where all of his losses could be.