“Killing Men of Steel”

UNIVERSITY OF CONNEC TICUT STUDENT SUPPORT SERV ICES PORTAL SUMMER 2008 THANK YOU! To the English Teachers — Rebecca Devers, Emily Dolan, Chris Dowd, Ramon Elinevsky, Mary Isbell, Brooke Morrill, and Amanda Tinder Smith. Your diligence to duty and the care you invest in your students help to make our English program the success that it is. To our English Tutors — Kelvin Ake, Cara Baummer, Jeremy DeAngelo, Erin Haddad-Null, Michael Jones, Sarah McIntyre, and Kate O’Sullivan — who have helped us define and refine our ideas so brilliantly, whether day or night. To the SSS Residential Staff and Counselors, whose support and encouragement of student success continues to inspire us all. To Bidya Ranjeet, Director of Student Support Services, and Maria D. Martinez, Director of the Center for Academic Programs. Without their leadership and kind hearts, much of what we accomplish could not be possible. To all of the CAP office staff, whose behind-the-scenes work holds us all together. And a special thank you to the students whose well-wrought words you read in these pages, as well as to ALL of the SSS students who strove for excellence in their writing this summer. With the exception of font and spacing, all student essays appear exactly as they were submitted. My thanks to these students for their continued enthusiasm and interest in free thinking, and for their endeavor to express their thoughts so vividly. Andrew Pfrenger, English Coordinator Table of Contents First Place: Han Zhang 1 Second Place: Thu Lam 5 Third Place: Crystal Pearl 11 Honorable Mention: Steven Ferreira 17 Momin Afrede 22 Damian Bryja 26 Ashley Burney 29 Edgar Cabrera 32 Suria Ceja 35 Raymond Chen 38 Andre Drummond 43 Brice Edwards 47 Grace Marie Figueroa 51 Allan Givens 54 Erica Guerricaechebarria 55 Dennis Hanton 58 Yamile Hernandez 59 Yomary Herrera 61 Castro Jean-Gilles Jr. 65 Aisha Kearney 67 Mylva Lopes 72 Rodrigo Martinez 76 Kally Moquete-Gonzalez 80 Duc Ngo 84 Thien Nguyen 87 Tierra Pollock 91 Kaylani Rosado 94 Kris Scully 97 Richard Smith 101 Carolina Suarez 104 Brandon Sumpter 109 Joel Terón 113 Talicha Vaval 118 Michael White Jr. 120 Melony Wint 124 Han Zhang ~ First Place ~ Transcending Borders In a recent phone call from my sister, a United States Marine sergeant in Fallujah, Iraq, we were talking quite amicably, and catching up on events in our separate life. Then I breeched the topic of the ongoing war, and the disapproval of it. She related to me that, it hurts when people back in the states don‘t understand them, and instead jeer at them. I realize, as soldiers, they are upholding the country, nation and the honor of the people. It is their job, and it is just a shame that not everyone supports and aids them. It is this obstruction in communication that often times drive soldiers to utter despair, to engage in empowering activities, and become detached from reality. Tim O‘Brien is a realist, judging from his discussion about the actual implications of war. The implicit events happening in war means that the good guys are not always triumphant. War Stories may be twisted to give moral and theme to better men, but that isn‘t the true method to tell what a true war story is. Hemingway‘s In Our Time does not tell a true war story based on O‘Brien‘s criteria because of one misfire: morality, because O‘Brien said there should not be any. O‘Brien‘s war stories are limited; they only involved soldiers. However a war story doesn‘t just concern the soldier: it also involves the lives of everyone living in a war and touched by it. Hemingway realizes that and covers broad spectrum of subjects who are not only soldiers but also people influenced or relatively untouched by war. Hemingway tells a true war story. In Our Time transcends the limited perspective of O‘Brien and redefined war stories to be truly ―ours‖ and enlightening to the common individual. O‘Brien uses the soldier‘s perspective effectively and makes us intimately aware of their reactions to life and frustration at a world that does not understand them. His reaction to no response for the letter, he sent to Curt‘s sister, was ―Jesus Christ, man, I write this beautiful fucking letter, I slave over it, and what happens? The dumb cooze never writes back.‖ (O‘Brien 175). Rat: a soldier confident in his masculinity who probably has never let his heart out, is completely baffled and enraged that he poured his heart out to his best friend‘s sister, and no response was given. There is just such a great deal of pain, and struggle for a soldier. Civilians often times connect unpopular wars with soldiers, and they bash soldiers. It shows the general assumption by soldiers who think civilians don‘t understand all that they have gone through. Hemingway‘s method of stark and bleak situations concerning victims affected by war really helps the reader get a sense of the damage. Victims reading it, not only get a dose of war but also that 1 of people living in that era who are relatively unconcerned with the war. In directly avoiding the details of war, Hemingway seems to be making a statement about ―shell shocked‖ troops who can‘t acclimate to the times. He would rather troops be able to read it too, without going through the gore. However, Hemingway still attains the detached mentality of soldiers like in ―Soldier‘s Home.‖ Krebs who tried out lies, and found it distasteful, also tried out truth. In responding ―no‖ to his mother‘s question, ―…Don‘t you love your mother, dear boy?‖ (Hemingway 75-76). It is really distressing in both sides, considering what would make a mother doubt her own son‘s affection for her, and what action from the son provoked such a question. In using ―boy‖, Kreb‘s mother denies him: the manhood granted to him by war, and thus in Kreb‘s view, unmanning him. Krebs might actually question his own capacity for humanity and love as years of frequent trysts with prostitutes and wanton slaughter in war. The cause of this reckless killing might also be a sense of frustration at life. Rat Kiley visited senseless violence and pain upon the poor baby water buffalo when his best friend Curt Lemon died from a Vietnamese booby trap. The narrator describe it as ―…for now it was question of pain‖ (O‘Brien 180). Rat related the Vietnam trap that killed his friend to the baby buffalo in Vietnam and took out his grief in aggression. It shows Rat‘s frustration as their powerlessness in the odds of adversary, and in general, the soldier‘s fortunes being tied in to fate, and whatever destiny‘s whim may be. O‘Brien doesn‘t care for the opinions of others and that soldiers are his top priority. His view is only the contemporary perspective of war, with a twist. It is entirely about the soldier and war. There is no space for attempts to understand civilians, and the influence of war on their lives. It is this limited insight that makes O‘Brien, a narrow perspective writer. Showing his restricted view, O‘Brien, recounts the story of Rat Kiley. Responding to a woman‘s opinion that, it was a good story, O‘Brien calls her a, ―Dumb Cooze.”(O‘Brien 183) It is plain sight that O‘Brien wants people to see through the perspective of the soldier, and, obviously, does not care for the opinion of others. The war story is synonymous to soldier story. It is anecdote of a conflict with no rules, an absolute destructive force of all boundaries. It cleanses all that attempts to give it meaning. He wants to give war as it is, without any moral. He even admits, embellishing the story to make it more violent in it likeliness to war, to be a good one. The gore and the sheer violence in war, which O‘Brien uses, give readers a view of the war itself. It enables the reader to feel the reality of war, the senseless violence, the loss of dear friends, and unconcerned people. However, O‘Brien‘s writing is just one perspective, maybe the true way in which war stories should be told. O‘Brien in using such graphical depiction seemingly desires to shock the reader. It makes us realize, it will be immensely difficult for us to ever understand. That highlights, the very nature of the conflict that, the soldiers have to go through. It is an issue, I, a 2 civilians will never understand. This intense violent vacuum that draws in the reader and it is a very different contrast with Hemingway‘s style. Hemingway has a distinctive style of writing, an academic style which is remote and detached. It‘s almost like his statement on war, making the reading a lot more influential. Cohen A. Milton, in his essay ―Soldier‘s Voices In In Our Time: Hemingway‘s Ventriloquism‖ talks about how the writing style‖…It deflates emotion. ―It suggests a speaker who is psychologically detached-- emotionally drained, perhaps stunned, possibly even shell-shocked‖ (Milton 22). It shows that, the very nature of Hemingway‘s writing influences the psychological state of the readers, making it much more effective. Hemingway‘s style, displays a profound insight into the characters, themselves. The emotional detachment is a characteristic of the war broken soldiers. I enjoyed Hemingway‘s In Our Time more, also due to, it including the experiences of other people.

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