The fact that the reader is introduced to the story of Norman on the Fourth of July is ironic for the fact that the fourth of July is a holiday celebrated for freedom, and Norman went to war so the world could continue being free. Norman begins explaining the story of the death of Kiowa many times, and in one instance he speaks of “red and green and silver flares” coming down from the sky, and the “rain came down in Technicolor.” The vision of this made me think of fireworks, since the day Norman’s in right now is July fourth. The fact that the fireworks are going off on this specific day, forces Norman to relive the experience of the “shooting flares” and how the “rain came down in Technicolor” creating an image of a firework. As Norman is sitting at the lake, he notices how the “lake creates a mirror” of the fireworks “the reds and blues and greens.” However, the lake is not only creating a mirrored image of the fireworks, but a reflection in Norman’s mind of the image of war, and the “shooting flares” and ultimately the “sinking of Kiowa” in the mud.
Most people celebrate the fourth of July with family and friends, however, Norman has no one to celebrate with which is why he “drives around the lake” multiple times. Norman has a lavish need to tell someone of his experience with Kiowa, but has no one to tell the event to. Sally Kramer, whom Norman “carried pictures around of in his wallet” during war was now “married as Sally Gustafson.” The “lake had drowned” Norman’s best friend, Max Arnold, so Norman didn’t have Max to talk to either. The loneliness that Norman feels adds to the weight of the guilt that Norman faces for the death of Kiowa. All Norman wants is to tell someone of the story. As Norman drives around the lake, he pretends to tell the story to his father, Sally, and Max. However, all Norman is doing is repeating the story over and over again to himself. At one point, Norman gets so desperate as to wanting someone to talk to, that as he goes through the drive-through he begins talking to the intercom. As Norman finishes his meal, he goes back to the intercom and asks the voice at the other end “how would you like to hear about—“ and then stops. The voice in the intercom replies by saying that the voice “isn’t going anywhere” but Norman replies with “nothing” and drives away. Getting so desperate as to almost telling Norman’s feeling to a drive-through intercom shows just how drastically Norman needs someone to talk to.
When Norman first goes through the drive-through, a young girl comes up and Norman attempts to order his meal from her. The girl simply “laughs” and points to “an intercom attached to a steel post.” Then as Norman is ordering his food, the voice asks if he wants a “rootie-tootie” and not knowing what a rootie-tootie is, Norman is baffled. The bewilderment that Norman experiences shows the reader just how much events change after war, and how much the soldiers have to adapt to when they return back home. Loneliness is a patent feeling of Norman both after the war, and during the war after Kiowa died…the only emotion Norman felt was loneliness. Norman was completely “alone.”
Within the entire chapter, Norman repeats over and over again the death of his friend Kiowa, and how Norman is responsible for the death of Kiowa. Norman received “seven medals” from the war, but all Norman can concentrate on is how he failed to receive the “Silver Star.” Almost every page of the chapter, the reader is brought back to the image of “Kiowa slipping underneath the mud,” and how Norman wasn’t able to prevent Kiowa’s death. The repetition of the event shows the guilt that Norman feels over and over again. The reoccurring thought of Kiowa’s death and the image of Kiowa’s “gold wristwatch” and “part of a boot,” and then later on how Norman “grabbed hold of the boot” but not being able to handle the stench, let go of Kiowa’s boot, and let Kiowa slide into the “shit field.”
On the night that Kiowa died, there was a “heavy rain.” The raining on the night of Kiowa’s death symbolizes the sadness, and the tragedy of the death. Rain usually symbolizes purification, but ironically in the story, the rain causes the waste in the field to become mucky and sticky, which then causes the death of Kiowa. The purification of the rain is taken away by the human waste field.
The effects of loneliness that Norman encounters is shown in the next chapter, Notes, as the chapter opens up describing how Norman “hung himself in a locker room” because the isolation Norman experienced was too much to deal with. O’Brien doesn’t put the fact of Norman’s suicide in there just for the story of Norman Bowker, but also to make the reader aware of the emotional stress that soldiers go through not only during war, but after the war is over with.
O’Brien received a letter from Norman explaining how after the war, Norman couldn’t find a “meaningful use for his life.” Norman tried out several jobs such as working at “A&W, an automotive salesmen, janitor, and car wash attendant” but none of these jobs made him feel “useful.” Norman couldn’t find a job where anything was “real” or “tangible”- not like “the stakes of a war.”
The difference between the personalities of Norman Bowker and Tim O’Brien is that O’Brien’s transformation after the war was much easier than Norman’s. O’Brien didn’t experience any “flashbacks” or “midnight sweats.” O’Brien states that he “never talked about the war conversationally” however, O’Brien did in fact talk about the war every day. Not verbally, but the ink on pages is the way O’Brien dealt with the war. Writing down his thoughts and experiences was a reliever for O’Brien after the war--the pages in the book was the substantial person that O’Brien needed to talk to. Norman had no one to tell his experience to, therefore Norman was isolated and trapped in his own mind with the thoughts and memories of the war. O’Brien saved himself from the “swirl of memories” that might have “ended in paralysis or worse.” By writing, O’Brien was able to “objectify [his] own experiences” and sort out all the details and emotions he felt. Unlike Norman, whose loneliness and isolation led to suicide.
Norman asked O’Brien to write a story about Kiowa and the tragedy that Norman experienced. O’Brien used the “lake as the nucleus around which the story would orbit.” The lake was the main focus of Norman, and in the previous chapter, the lake was the main point in the story- for the lake was what Norman revolved around the entire day. The lake is used as a symbol of the shit field. The field is where Kiowa died, and the main focus and reason that Kiowa died was in fact the field of mud, which ironically was poop. The irony in the “shit field” is symbolized that the war is unpleasant and that the war nonetheless “stinks.” However, using a lake in the story of Norman is a more pleasant way to show the story of Norman, rather than the field of waste showing the unpleasant and tragic death of Kiowa.
Within the next chapter, In the Field, the story of Kiowa’s death is brought up again, but in the point of view from many different soldiers, not just the aspect of Norman. Lieutenant Cross is searching for Kiowa’s body, and as Cross tries to identify one soldier from another, he finds it difficult because the “filth erases the identity, transforming the men into identical copies of a single soldier” which is how Cross is supposed to treat each solider. However, Cross chooses rather to view the men as “human beings” not “units.” Not only does this show a bond between the soldiers, but also the fact that the men stayed out in the “shit field” to find Kiowa’s body. The guys could have said that it would be too much work, or it wasn’t worth their time. Instead, each of them felt that they owed it to Kiowa to search for his body. By doing so, the bond of the soldiers is shown to the reader and how strong of relationships the men build at war.
Guilt is one of the themes within the story, and becomes more evident after the death of Kiowa. Not only does Norman blame himself for not being able to save Kiowa from slipping under the waste, but Lieutenant Cross, Azar, and one of the younger soldiers also feel guilty. Cross feels guilty because he set up camp on the “shit field” and after Kiowa’s death, Cross knew he should have “went with [his] instinct” and set up camp on “higher ground.” Azar feels guilty because of all the immature jokes that Azar says. Azar feels if he would have “kept his mouth shut” then “none of that would have happened.” The youngest soldier feels guilty because he was showing Kiowa a picture of his girlfriend, and it was “too dark” and the two of them couldn’t see her. So the young soldier took out his flashlight even though he “knew he shouldn’t have shined the light.” Right after the flash of the light shone, the flares shot at them, and Kiowa was soon sinking under the waste. Norman simply replies to the guilt by saying that it wasn’t “nobody’s fault” it was “everybody’s.” Norman means that everybody can have an excuse for why the death of Kiowa is their own fault, so in reality, it wasn’t one person’s fault. However everyone still continues to replay in their head the experience of what has happened, and how each of them had something to do with the death of Kiowa.
In the beginning of the story until now, Azar has been known as an immature character cracking lame jokes on every subject. The men become most fed up with Azar after he begins telling jokes after Kiowa dies and how Kiowa is now “eating shit” and “wasted in a waste field.” However, once the men discover Kiowa’s body, Azar feels a sense of guilt. O’Brien describes in the first few chapters how the men coming to war are not in fact “men” but “boys.” Azar isn’t the mature man that some of the others are when they first arrive to war, but as the war goes on, Azar realizes his immaturity. The war has had more a positive effect on Azar—the war forced Azar to grow up.
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