A thing may happen and be a total lie; another thing may not happen and be truer than the truth. For example: Four guys go down a trail. A grenade sa… - Tim O'Brien
" "A thing may happen and be a total lie; another thing may not happen and be truer than the truth. For example: Four guys go down a trail. A grenade sails out. One guy jumps on it and takes the blast, but it's a killer grenade and everybody dies anyway. Before they die, though, one of the dead guys says, "The fuck you do that for?" and the jumper says, "Story of my life, man" and other guys start to smile but he's dead. That's a true story that never happened.
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About Tim O'Brien
Tim O'Brien (born October 1, 1946) is an American novelist who mainly writes about his experiences in the Vietnam War and the impact that the war had on the American soldiers who fought there.
Also Known As
Alternative Names:
William Timothy "Tim" O'Brien
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Additional quotes by Tim O'Brien
At night, when I couldn't sleep, I'd sometimes carry on silent arguments with those people. I'd be screaming at them, telling them how much I detested their blind, thoughtless, automatic acquiescence to it all, their simpleminded patriotism, their prideful ignorance, their love-it-or-leave it platitudes, how they were sending me off to fight a war they didn't understand and didn't want to understand.
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Any soldier will tell you, if he tells the truth, that proximity to death brings with it a corresponding proximity to life. After a firefight, there is always the immense pleasure of aliveness. The trees are alive. the grass, the soil — everything. All around you things are purely living, and you among them, and the aliveness makes you tremble.
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