Readers might perceive O'B1ien's story to be a powerfi.illy realistic evocation of war :is people actually live it. On the other hand, in spite of its realistic qualities, the st01y sometimes bt:comcs...

Readers might perceive O'B1ien's story to be a powerfi.illy realistic evocation of war :is people actually live it. On the other hand, in spite of its realistic qualities, the st01y sometimes bt:comcs highly poetic, as in passages like this one: Twenty years later, I can still see the sunlight on Lemon's face. I can see him turning, looking back at Rat Kiley, then he laughed and took the curious half step from shade into sunlight, his face suddenly brown and shinjng, and when his foot touched down, in that instant, he must've thought it wa� the sunlight that ,;vas kiJJing him. Is O'Brien guilty of aestheticizing war-that is, of making it seem more beautiful, romantic, or exotic than it really is? Do you think that your reading of his accoL111t has made you less likely or more likely to regard war as .necessary and noble? Has O'Brien's account made it less likely or more likely that you wj]] think of war as a nacuraJ and even indispensable part of life as a human being?