Tim O'Brien

Tim O'Brien was born in Austin, Minnesota, and grew up in Worthington, a small town in the south of the state. He graduated from Macalester College in 1968 and was drafted soon after. He opposed the Vietnam War and thought about fleeing to Canada, but he went. He served as an infantryman in Quang Ngai Province in 1969 and 1970 and was wounded.

After the war he did graduate work in government at Harvard and reported for The Washington Post. His first book, If I Die in a Combat Zone (1973), is a memoir of his tour. His novel Going After Cacciato won the National Book Award in 1979.

The Things They Carried (1990) is a set of linked stories about a platoon in Vietnam, narrated by a character named Tim O'Brien. It lists what each soldier carries, from weapons to letters to fear, and keeps blurring the line between what happened and what is invented. It argues that a made-up story can carry more truth about war than a factual report. He later taught creative writing at Texas State University.