In "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall" Ellen Weatherall is an elderly woman who is on her deathbed; she has always been a strong willed and an independent woman, she had gone through being left at the alter by George who she was going to marry, and her husband John who died. After the death of John she was left with three kids to care and provide food for, this is how Katherine Anne Porter shows that Granny is an intelligent and strong willed woman who is still depended upon by her children for advice: "Sh

Porter, Katherine. "The Jilting of Granny Wetherall." Literature Reading Fiction, Poetry, And Drama. Robert DiYanni. New York: Mc Graw Hill, 2002. 443-449.

In conclusion both stories "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall" and "The Things They Carried" had the common theme of dealing with reality, each character had their own way to deal with it. For Granny she came to the realization that she was never going to forgive George for jilting her and that she had to face the reality of going to hell rather than heaven. Lieutenant Cross realized that his reality was different and far apart from the woman he loves, but only after one of his men was killed. The reality that he is in now cannot be tied to her world, which is why he burns the pictures. Meanwhile the other men dealt with the reality of war through cutting of a thumb a dead corpse or carrying a rabbit's foot.

e wasn't too old yet for Lydia to be driving eighty miles for advice when one of the children jumped the track, and Jimmy still dropped in and talked things over: "Now, Mammy, you've a good business head, I want to know what you think of this?..." Old Cornelia couldn't change the furniture around without asking. Little things, little things!" (Porter 445). This example clarifies two attributes of Granny one is that she was wise and her children have always felt comfortable asking her for advice because they trust her. Secondly that Granny is used to having control over many aspects of her life due to the fact that she has been so independent. She had been independent when George jilted her at her wedding and when John dies.

Likewise in the short story "The Thing's They Carried" Lieutenant Jimmy Cross and the men in his unit must deal with the reality that they are in the Vietnam War. Throughout this story the author Tim O'Brien describes a wide variety of items each of the soldiers carry with them during war from M-14's, to photos, to comic books. Cross carried two photographs of Martha, who was a girl who he left back home at Mount Sebastian college although he know that she had a boyfriend he had a fixation with her which distracted him from his own surroundings and responsibilities to his men. While in the jungles of Vietnam, Ted Lavender who was one of the men in Jim's unit was shot and killed by an enemy fighter. He was killed right in front of

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Approximate Word count = 1578
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)