Sweetheart+of+the+Song+Tra+Bong

  //She had crossed to the other side. She was part of the land. She was wearing her culottes, her pink sweater and a necklace of human tongues. She was dangerous. She was ready for the kill.//

The //Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong// is one of the most explored stories in The //Things They Carried//. It features the character Mary Anne Bell who is the definitive symbol of young and innocent America. Her innocence is important because it emphasises the way that Vietnam can affect even the most pure American. In this story O’Brien recalls a story of Rat Kiley’s. Though Rat swears the story is true, O’Brien doubts its accuracy because Rat is a notorious exaggerator. Rat had been assigned to a medical detachment near Tra Bong in an area the medics shared with six Green Berets. The groups did not interact often. During an all-night drinking session, a medic jokingly mentions that the medics should pool their money and import some prostitutes from Saigon. One medic, Mark Fossie, is taken by the idea, and six weeks later his high school sweetheart, Mary Anne Bell, arrives at the compound. Mary Anne is a pretty 17 year old and Mark plans to marry her. She insists on learning about Vietnamese culture and the Vietnam War up close. Mary Anne begins to assist when the medical unit receives casualties. Eventually she stops wearing make-up, and her attention is consumed by learning how to use an M-16 assault rifle. Fossie suggests that she return home, but she does not. Mary Anne seems to develop an overly strong interest in the war. One night she disappears to go out on an ambush with the Green Berets. She begins staying out late, finally staying out all night. The next morning Mary Anne returns wearing green fatigues and carrying a rifle. She tells Fossie that they will talk later, but he is angry and will not wait. Later that day, Mary Anne appears fully groomed, wearing her feminine clothes. Fossie explains that they officially became engaged, and the pair maintains a façade of happiness. Fossie makes arrangements for Mary Anne's trip home. The next morning she disappears again with the Green Berets. Three weeks pass until she returns. The next day Fossie waits outside the Green Berets' area, waiting to see Mary Anne. He hears an eerie human voice. Pushing inside the Green Berets' hootch, he sees piles of bones, smells a horrendous stench, and hears Mary Anne chanting. She tells Fossie that she likes this life and that he does not belong there. Mary Anne has become a fully-fledged fighting maniac. She wears a tongue necklace. Mary Anne has become addicted to Vietnam -"You're in touch with the far side of yourself." Eventually she drifts off by herself into the hills and is never seen again. You can compare Mary Anne to Colonel Kurtz in //Apocalypse Now// as she has her dark side that is beyond the civilised world. She had embraced the horror. the horror. Like many of O’Brien’s stories, this one is not really about what it seems to be about. This is not a story about Mary Anne and her transformation—it is a story about storytelling and the loss of innocence. The tale is about loss of innocence. Mary Anne is a convenient character because as a young person from the suburbs, a high school sweetheart, and a woman, she personifies innocence to the soldiers. Her progression from a sweet girlfriend to something more bestial than the Green Berets is an analogy for the loss of innocence through which all soldiers of Vietnam go. “O’Brien,” Azar, Kiowa, Sanders, and all the young men sent to Vietnam departed from America “green” and left their innocence like baggage on the fields of a foreign land. For Mary Anne, the presence of her sweetheart gave her moments of pause in her transformation, where she took occasional steps back into sweetness. For the men of Alpha Company, a letter, a picture, or a pair of stockings could have pulled them back to the world of cleanliness and refinement, the world of love. Eventually, though, they all passed into the war, into violence, dirt, murder, and darkness. Just like Mary Anne, the innocent persons they were would never be seen again.