Post Traumatic Stress and the Brothers' Relationship in The Red Convertible by Louise Erdrich

Henry is drafted to fight in the Vietnam war and returns a very different person. Lyman says, “When he came home, though, Henry was very different, and I’ll say this: the change was no good” (Erdrich 4). Henry becomes transfixed on the television set. At one point, Henry bites his lip so hard that blood pours from his wound down his chin and he does nothing but continue to watch the television (Erdrich 4).

Upon returning home the soldiers meet a field of new troubles that come with acclimation to society after fighting. Many soldiers come home with skills that are not applicable to their lives and generally a much deeper understanding of what they believe the world consists of. This leads to much disillusion with the world they come back to. In both Ernest Hemingway and Tim O’Brien’s stories, soldiers meet with disillusionment and disconnect from society. The soldiers react in different ways to this feeling; the authors use diction, sentence structure, and figurative language to demonstrate their troubles with acclimation.

The relationship of brothers usually lasts forever, but in Louise Erdrich’s short story “The Red Convertible”, the relationship of the main characters Lyman and Henry takes a turn. Erdrich takes her audience through the experiences these brothers face and how they must come to terms that their relationship has changed. Knowing that it will most likely never be the same both Lyman and Henry try to fix their relationship until eventually one falls because of the experiences he faced in life. While Lyman may think the red convertible will save his and Henry’s relationship, Erdrich makes it clear that it will not through the characterization of the brothers, the plot of the story, and the symbolism she uses to tell her story.

In the Red Convertible by Louise Erdrich, the main character Henry loses his hold on reality. The story takes place in North Dakota on an Indian Reservation where Henry lives with his brother Lyman. Henry and Lyman buy a Red Convertible that later in the story illustrates Henry’s lack of ability to stay sane. The brothers take a summer trip across the United States in the car. When they return, Henry is called to join the army, which turns out to be the transitional point in Henry and Lyman’s personal life. The Vietnam War changed Henry’s appearance, psyche, and his feelings about the Red Convertible.

In the book Soldier’s Heart by Gary Paulsen, Charley Goddard says, “I have got to become a man sometime.” Charley, a boy about 15 years old, lives on a farm with his ma, and his little brother Oran. His dad will not come around anymore because he gets kicked to death by a horse that goes mad.The horse goes mad because a bee lands on it. Charley wants to me a man and grow up, so he continues to ask his ma if he can join the army. His ma lets him join the army because she thinks the war will quickly come to an end, but little does she know it will not. Charley joins the war, and comes out with a soldier’s heart. A soldier’s heart represents the soldiers that come home looking different or acting different from when they first left. Also known as PTSD, which goes by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Charley develops from a boy looking for adventure into a young man with a “soldier’s heart” because he

Young men who are sent to a war learn the reality in a very harsh and brutal way. Both the stories, ‘The Red Convertible’ and ‘The Things They Carried’ portray the life of a young soldier and how he psychologically gets affected from all the things he had seen in the war. Tim O’Brien’s ‘The Things They Carried,’ is more specific on the experiences of a soldier during a war where as Karen Louise Erdrich focuses more on describing the post war traumatic stress in her short story ‘The Red Convertible’. One thing similar in both the narrations is the Vietnam War and its consequences on the soldiers. From the background of both the authors it’s easy to conclude that Tim O’Brien being a war veteran emphasizes more on the

“The Red Convertible” demonstrates the cause and effect of past memories with present experiences, particularly the effect of war. The memories shared between the brothers before Henry’s draft begins with the purchase of a red convertible. Both of the brothers equally purchased the red convertible with their earned income. The red convertible personified the brother’s

The short story that will be discussed, evaluated, and analyzed in this paper is a very emotionally and morally challenging short story to read. Michael Meyer, author of the college text The Compact Bedford Introduction to Literature, states that the author of How to Tell a True War Story, Tim O’Brien, “was drafted into the Vietnam War and received a Purple Heart” (472). His experiences from the Vietnam War have stayed with him, and he writes about them in this short story. The purpose of this literary analysis is to critically analyze this short story by explaining O’Brien’s writing techniques, by discussing his intended message and how it is displayed, by providing my own reaction,

Hundreds of bodies littered the ground. Sounds of explosions and endless gunfire filled the air. Soldiers, with their uniforms splashed in crimson, fought viciously and ruthlessly. Their main objective, which was to win the battle, took a backseat to their newfound desperation to stay alive. After all, war is not a game, especially one such as the Vietnam War. The Vietnam War claimed hundreds of thousands of lives, and left its survivors haunted by a multitude of atrocious events. Terry Erickson’s father and George Robinson, who were two fictional characters from the short stories “Stop the Sun” and “Dear America”, respectively, were veterans of the Vietnam War. The differences and similarities between Terry’s father and George Robinson are striking, and they merit rigorous scrutiny.

     It is always said that war changes people. In the short story 'The Red Convertible', Louise Erdrich uses Henry to show how it affects people. In this case, the effects are psychological. You can clearly see a difference between his personalities from before he goes to war compared to his personalities after returns home from the war. Before the war, he is a care-free soul who just likes to have fun. After the war, he is very quiet and defensive, always watching his back as if waiting for someone to strike.

Henry used to be serene, but now he is uneasy. Lyman recalls the times when Henry "sat for whole afternoons, never moving a muscle" says Lyman (4). Of course, anyone who enters the military and experiences combat will not remain calm, but Henry must have really seen a lot of terror because he had never gone back to the same person he was. Henry's unusual moods disturb Lyman, distressing his emotions. This brother does not seem much like the one that used to spend quality time with him, relaxed and carefree, sharing the red convertible.

According to “‘We Will All Be Lost and Destroyed’: Post – Traumatic Stress Disorder and The Civil War” by Eric T. Dean, Jr., “Psychologists estimate that approximately five hundred thousand to 1.5 million of three million Vietnam veterans may suffer from symptoms of PTSD,” which includes “wide variety of problems, from alcoholism, drug abuse, divorce, homelessness, and unemployment, to anxiety disorders and suicide” (Dean 1). Not only did the Vietnam War cost many lives and a lot of money, but it also has serious influences on veterans. In the short story “The Red Convertible,” written by Louise Erdrich, concerns a relationship of an American brothers, Lyman and Henry before and after the Vietnam War. Before the war, they are close,

War forces young soldiers to grow up quickly. In Stephen Crane’s Civil War novel, The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming is no exception. He is faced with the hard reality of war and this forces him to readjust his romantic beliefs about war. Through the novel, the reader can trace the growth and development of Henry through these four stages: (1) romanticizing war and the heroic role each soldier plays, (2) facing the realities of war, (3) lying to himself to maintain his self-importance, and (4) realistic awareness of his abilities and place in life. Through Henry’s experiences in his path to self-discovery, he is strongly affected by events that help shape his ideology of war, death,

In the opening paragraphs of the novel Back, author Henry Green expresses how one is affected by war through a soldier named Charley, who suffered greatly during the war. The novel, published in 1946, takes place one year after one of the most catastrophic events in history World War II in England and therefore expresses an antiwar tone throughout the passage. Using the third person limited point of view, Green gives an insight of how Charley losing the love of his life after the war completely altered his version of reality. Through the portrayal of Charley’s trauma, Henry Green demonstrates that war is a tragic experience that permanently changes one’s life because of different variables such as loss.

In “The Red Convertible,” Lyman Lamartine is the narrator and the protagonist at the same time. Lyman was a young boy who at his short age had successfully accomplished many goals and dreams that soon after were just in his memory. In the short story, Lyman talks about the amazing relationship that he has with his older brother Henry Lamartine. However, everything changes after Henry comes back from the military service. Lyman tries to help his brother to overcome with the post-traumatic stress disorder that the war had left on him. Unfortunately, Henry takes his own life, leaving Lyman devastated because he feels that he could not help his brother.