The
Things They Carried is a series of short pieces about a platoon of American soldiers in the Vietnam War. The book, published in 1990, combines nonfiction and fiction drawn from Tim O'Brien’s experiences as a soldier in the 23rd Infantry
Division.
I probably most enjoyed "Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong."
An American soldier
stationed in an isolated camp arranges to have his hometown girlfriend flown in, but she changes there, and the cheery, small-town girl assimilates a group of guerrillas. This is a good story, but the idea is clearly taken from "Apocalypse Now," which borrows from Heart of Darkness.
The passages of the essay-like titular piece, "The Things They Carried," recounts in detail the variety of supplies
and miscellany the soldiers take from camp to camp, supply drop to supply
drop. The main character is a lieutenant, a platoon leader, who carries reminders
of an unrequited love back home. A soldier in his platoon dies, and the lieutenant blames himself for being distracted by memories. The inventory
and weighing of all the objects is effective by itself; the juxtaposing this
with the carrying of memories and feelings is okay.
I expected a novel
and felt like I was given ideas on scraps of paper.
Note: I had read some or all of The
Things They Carried in college but remembered none of it.
LQ Jones died earlier this month. He played memorable roles in "Casino" and some Peckinpah movies like "The Wild Bunch." He was also on some of the old TV shows.
One of my favorites was when he had a small role on an episode of "Columbo." He
played an arms dealer named Jensen. Jensen wears a cowboy hat and Western-style
sport coat and bolo, and his cover is that he sells RVs. When you first see
him, he’s the RV salesman, out on the lot, pumping handshakes and pumping up
the merchandise—“We've got the largest inventory west of Chicago! Super savings
on every shape, every make, every model!”
The story involves a gun buyer named Devlin murdering Pauley,
the broker of a small-arms deal with Jensen. Jensen eventually comes to Devlin,
showing up with an RV, and pitches Devlin about making a deal—he must know
Devlin is the murderer. Devlin at first does not believe Jensen is the arms
dealer and says he’s not interested.
Jensen: “Brother
Devlin? Don't say no before you hear my offer. I've got a sweetheart of a deal.
Make your eyes pop. One look'll make you a believer. Just like I made a
believer out of brother Pauley.”
Devlin: “Indeed.”
They step inside the RV, and then Jones’ movements and
line delivery take over. Jensen takes off his hat, drops it on a little
kitchenette table, and turns to look around at the interior as if to absorb for
a moment a bit of its greatness. Then he lets out the vocalized sigh of the
weary: “Huh-ho. It's, uh, kinda nice, ain't it?”
That “huh-ho” reveals something. I make the sound
sometimes when I’m really, really stressed and have to push myself through
something I don’t want to do.
After the sigh, he turns around with a matter-of-fact
look on his thin face, which sticks out from under long gray-white hair swept
across his forehead. He says, “Yeah, I can put you in one of these little
beauties for, uh—about $150,000.”
The price is way, way above market for an RV at the
time, but the buyer is unphased.
Jensen: “I've
got your merchandise, brother. I was gonna deliver to Pauley, but wouldn't you
know?, he turned up dead.”
Devlin:
“Yes. Unfortunate.”
Then Jensen props one butt cheek on the little table,
leans forward with a wry, humorless smirk on his face and confesses, “And I'm
holding the goods. The deal all made, my middleman out of business, and no cash
to feed the bulldog. So the guns are all yours, brother Devlin. Same price,
same terms. Cash on the barrel head.” The animated tenor and rhythm of the
salesman has softened, and you empathize with his predicament, almost forgetting he’s trying to unload a truckload of sub-machine guns.
Notes:
This episode, "The Conspirators," aired May 13, 1978, in season 7, episode 5. It starred Clive Revill as Joe Devlin with Peter Falk as Columbo.
LQ Jones was born August 19, 1927, and died July 9, 2022.
The loneliness of a rank of six public pay phones moves me today almost to tears, and I wonder, dropping in my quarters, if you will allow this odd nostalgic
impulse toward anachronism to go through. That is, if you will answer this morning’s call from an unknown number, or let it, by the cold mechanism
of that which is called caller ID, be rerouted to what is known as voice mail. And then, on hearing your unreal voice, if I will, nevertheless, tell you that it’s me.
But no, I hang up, and from the pay phone on the far right I call the one one slot left, and from the third, call the next one left, and from the fifth, call the sixth and final phone,
creating as I do a carillon of overlapping, almost identical rings, disturbing the many students studying in this building, where no one’s home.
As I leave, I dial you on my cell phone, and you answer, asking if I’ve just called, saying the number was strange, that you’d called back but heard only a busy-signal’s drone.
Ah, love, let us be true to one another in almost every way, I also do not say. I’m at the door now, this cold and snowy day, thinking of the old high ways one lover
once spoke to another, over wires, when a call could be a complete surprise. Still you ask, what is that strange bell noise? And I answer, just the ringing in my ears.
In the lead-up to the hardcore band’s new release, Outright’s singer Jelena Goluza talks music,
inspiration, and elections
A melodious ferocity runs through the new album by
metallic hardcore band Outright. Keep You Warm will be released
July 15th through the Australian band’s own label, Rage and Reason Records. I took this release as an opportunity to hear directly from the
band’s vocalist, Jelena Goluza.
Damon:
Jelena, thank you for your time! I read that the band formed around 2010. Since
then, the band has released a couple of EPs and is about to release its second
LP. You have also toured with bands like Propagandhi, Refused, and Rise
Against. How has life since 2010 shaped you? How do you think experiences have
affected the band and the music?
Jelena Goluza:
I think playing in this band has provided a lot of catharsis over the years.
Having a voice and the energetic output has enabled us to express a lot of what
we’ve been through or feel. While this still comes through in our new music,
there’s also more reflection and introspection that comes with having the space
to push beyond the urgency to focus on other things.
Musically, and with many line-up changes over the
years, we’ve evolved to play a broader range of heavy punk that leans both to
metal and melody at times, faster in some songs and much slower in others. It’s
nice to stretch our legs. In the past 12 years, we’ve had the opportunity to
play anything from small art spaces to enormous arena shows, and we’ve learned
to fill each space differently and take our own special memories from them.
D: How has
the experience and work of being in a band changed?
JG: As a
band member and our label owner, I’ve definitely experienced the impact of
increasing digitisation, and it hurts. Normally, record sales would cover all
the costs for production so we can keep doing what we do, but online streaming
has taken all that away. There’s also the added burden of having to invest in
more video clips just to have that online presence. I mean, it’s fantastic to
be creative in more ways and to work with brilliant filmmakers to do that, but
the financial pressure is hard to manage.
We’ve noticed time management and touring gets harder
as we get older and carry other responsibilities in life, but we wouldn’t take
it on if it wasn’t fun and meaningful for us and important to back up what we
do in the studio.
D: The
album is remarkably focused—the songwriting and performances keep up a sense of
passion and enthusiasm. And I like how the aggression is balanced by guitar melodies.
For example, “Truth Teller” has a nice mix of urgency and drama, and I really
liked the parts that come at 1:07 on “Tied Through Time” and 2 minutes into
“Tyrants Vultures.” Please describe the song-writing process. How do you and
the band write songs? What comes first?
JG: Thanks
for being so kind. It’s nice when other people pick up the same bits we love in
those songs. The riffs come first. Always. Someone will come with an idea, we
workshop it together, and then when it finds some form, I’ll write lyrics to
match the mood and we go from there, adding layered guitars and backups. I
always love seeing what random changes get made at the last minute in the
studio, too, just to lift the track some more. We compile a library of ideas,
which is really useful for those times when we can resurrect a scrapped idea
that ends up being perfect for something else. It was interesting adapting to a
virtual song-writing process while our city was in lockdown for many months due
to COVID, but I’m proud of how we made it through.
D: What
non-musical works or forms of art and media influence you and the music?
JG:
Aboriginal artists like @coffinbirth teach us a lot about the First Nations
experience and inspire our solidarity and action. Our song “Tied Through Time”
is informed by reflections of the Bringing Them Home report on its 20th
anniversary. Forced removals in modern child protection policies are known to
cause what is now considered a second stolen generation event among First
Nations peoples in Australia, yet Aboriginal people remain the
longest-surviving civilisation in the world and should be celebrated.
The song “Silent Spring” is inspired by Rachel
Carson's book of the same name published in 1962. It taught us about the
environmental impact of pesticides, and we’ve since learned the risk and
tragedy when we don’t pay attention to science, even for our own survival.
Our video for “The Hammer” takes the premise
from Maleus Maleficarum and flips it with the influence of various films
and plays based on the history of witch hunts.
More generally, we’re influenced by intersectional
progressive literature and commentators, artists like Weiwei and Haring and
political documentaries and podcasts.
D: What
makes you feel good?
JG:
Personally, exercise and nature always makes me feel good. I think what makes
the band feel good is knowing we’ve tried our best and connected with others
who relate to what we do. Everything always comes back to community-building,
creativity, and catharsis.
D: In the
US, where I am, news of Australia’s most recent election was largely crowded
out by domestic stories and the war in Ukraine. What are your thoughts on
Australia’s election?
JG: I think
our recent federal election was a clear indication that our national community
is rising up and speaking for people and the environment. We’ve seen more seats
move away from the conservative party to greens and independents than ever
before. People have witnessed the crushing impact and disappointment of
conservative governments and become more engaged to set things right. I think
there was also a strong backlash against the former government for how poorly
it handled sexual assault in Parliament and industry, delayed vaccine roll
outs, homophobic and transphobic policies, flood and bushfire prevention and
relief, constitutional recognition for First Nations people, and corruption.
Women spoke out with their votes louder than ever. Young people spoke out with
their votes to make a difference when the older generations never acted on
their behalf. It’s been the change we’ve been waiting so long for, and we’re
invigorated to hold the new government to account to carry that change through.
D: What do
you think of compulsory voting and Australia’s version of it?
JG: I think
there are arguments for and against compulsory voting, but I’m satisfied with
my experience of it in Australia. I feel it is the best opportunity to engage
and capture the views of a wide population and get as close as possible to the
level of representation required to comprise a democracy. Even though we have
to deal with preferences, we can still vote to ensure our preferences also lean
in the direction we want leadership in. This increases legitimacy and
responsiveness more than other electoral systems can. Even though true
democracy relies on higher levels of education, compulsory voting is at least a
way to engage and inform more people about how policy and power affects them
and equalises them in the weight of each vote. Some people think it forces
people to vote, but there is nothing stopping someone from lodging a blank
paper if they choose to disengage. That said, voting policies aren’t the be-all
and end-all. Our entire political system needs to back that up, and its players
need to constantly be held to account with transparency and integrity.
