A True War Story

"In any war story, but especially a true one, it's difficult to separate what happened from what seemed to happen...And then afterward, when you go to tell about it, there is always that surreal seemingness, which makes the story seem untrue, but which in fact represents the hard and exact truth as it seemed. In many cases a true war story cannot be believed. If you believe it, be skeptical. It's a question of credibility. Often the crazy stuff is true and the normal stuff isn't, because the normal stuff is necessary to make you believe the truly incredible craziness" (page 71). We have all heard war stories before. Whether it is a heroic "normal" story or a "crazy" adventurous story, we have all heard one. However, we often find them difficult to believe. Sometimes the "crazy" stories seem simply too unreasonable to possibly be true. The "normal" war stories are often more believable because they are things we expect to hear and picture when we think of war. This is what O' Brien means when he says many people are skeptical about the stories. What seems to be true and what actually is true are not necessarily the same thing.