Analyze a character in the story. How are they characterized by the author? What is their role in the story? What do you think of them? Why?
For some odd reason, Ted Lavender was a character that really stood out to me. When he was first introduced, it was in the midst of one of the paragraphs where he lists the things the soldiers carried. O'Brien said, "Ted Lavender, who was scared, carried tranquilizers.." (2). The fact that he was introduced as being scared as his trait that he possessed was very interesting to me and made me have a lot of questions about who Lavender was and what he did. Why was Lavender in the war in the first place if he was scared? Maybe he was drafted which would make sense, for the Vietnam War did use a draft for one of the only times in American history. This man was so scared that he had to use tranquilizers to keep him calm and able to continue in the war.
Then, something very troubling happened to Lavender after he was coming back from going to the bathroom, he was shot in the brain and killed. This to me was truly heartbreaking because this young man was so scared his whole time in the war, and it actually ended horribly for him. His character symbolizes how anyone in the war could die even the most innocent and scared. Lavender did not deserve to die, and this makes readers really think about how unfair the war was and how death can reach you at any time. This man was not trying to get into a fight, for he was just using the restroom. His life still ended. Ted Lavender, while he was not a main character, was very essential to maintaining the theme and tones of the war and the novel.
Caroline Humphrey
Period 2
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