In the book Madagascar Plum by Nguyon Thi Minh Ngoc it is about a former Saigon soldier of the war who struggled with Post Tramatic Stress Disorder. He talks about his experiences in the Vietnam war and how his drinking problems is caused by those stressful experiences and how it connects to his Post Tramatic Stress Disorder. These two reason makes the narrator an unreliable source.
Like most soldiers the author has a mojor drinking problem and its understandable considering his experiences with the war. It is evident that this is his coping mechanism. You can tell that he loves to drink when you read the second paragraph he says "pour me a drink, and when I finished it, ill tell you the story" (Ngoc 1). This shows hows important it is for him to be consumed with achohol that he can only tell the story under the influence. It also seems like the alcohol helps him remember things better than if he was sober. The narrator talks about a specific night that changed his life because of the fact he was under the influence of alcohol. This is what made him upset in the first place in the beginning of the story. "The night that if I hadn't been under the devilish influenced of alcohol wouldnt have turned out the way it did" (Ngoc 9). The author relies so much on alcohol and when you know someone is always under the influence you cant always believe what they say and that is the situation with the narrator. This is why he is an unreliable source because there is a chance of him always switching up his thoughts on things.
In terms of his Post Tramatic Stress Disorder it is really hard for him to remember certain situations. The things that he thinks about may be something that has happened in the past and he might try to connect it to the present, or in the present trying to connect something in the past. His memory started to act up when the waitress brought him the plum he started to turn pale and compared himself to a women having a miscarriage. "The plums brownish hue is so similar to the tones in the complexion of that impudent child" (Ngoc 1). The plum also brings back bad memories of the little girl and when situations like this happens its hard to believe what is true or not.
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In the book Madagascar Plum by Nguyon Thi Minh Ngoc it is about a former Saigon soldier of the war who struggled with Post Tramatic Stress Disorder. He talks about his experiences in the Vietnam war and how his drinking problems is caused by those stressful experiences. These experiences connects to his Post Tramatic Stress Disorder and these two problems cause a chain of problematic issues throughout the story. These two reason makes the narrator an unreliable source.
ReplyDeleteLike most soldiers the author has a mojor drinking problem and its understandable considering his experiences with the war. It is evident that this is his coping mechanism. You can tell that he loves to drink when you read the second paragraph. He says "pour me a drink, and when I finished it, ill tell you the story" (Ngoc 1). This shows hows important it is for him to be consumed with achohol that he can only tell the story under the influence. It also seems like the alcohol helps him remember things better than if he was sober. The narrator talks about a specific night that changed his life because of the fact he was under the influence of alcohol and this is what made him upset in the first place in the beginning of the story. "The night that if I hadn't been under the devilish influenced of alcohol wouldnt have turned out the way it did" (Ngoc 9). The author relies so much on alcohol and when you know someone is always under the influence you cant always believe what they say and that is the situation with the narrator. This is why he is an unreliable source because there is a chance of him always switching up his thoughts on things.He attempts to leave memories of the war behind as he drinks more and more of the Alcohol in the bottle. "The longer I remained inside eating and drinking, the more I lapsed into a stupor and the foggier I became"(6).
In terms of his Post Tramatic Stress Disorder it is really hard for him to remember certain situations. The things that he thinks about may be something that has happened in the past and he might try to connect it to the present, or in the present trying to connect something in the past. His memory started to act up when the waitress brought him the plum he started to turn pale and compared himself to a women having a miscarriage. "The plums brownish hue is so similar to the tones in the complexion of that impudent child" (Ngoc 1). The plum also brings back bad memories of the little girl and when situations like this happens its hard to believe what is true or not.
Throughout the story his consistant drinking allow me to come up with the conclusion that this man was unstable and therefore unreliable. Alot of this is due to his PTSD which may allow him to block out many of the details and allow him to try and forget so he can try to live a normal life, but this does not happened.