Week 2 Post A

mortared: A machine in which materials are ground and blended or crushed. (15)

Volition: a choice or decision made by the will. (15) 

Figurative Language:

1)"They carried the sky. The whole atmosphere, they carried it, the humidity, the monsoons, the stink of fungus and decay, all of it, they carried gravity"(15).  This excerpt is figurative language because they can't physically carry these things because they aren't tangible. It is said they are carrying these things to know what sort of mental things they had to carry. 

2)"Like cement"(17). this isn't a very descriptive quote but in context it makes sense that it is a simile because he is talking about what a soldier looked like when he was shot. 

3) "Zapped while Zipping"(17). Here's a term the soldiers use a lot to describe someone who was shot while taking a leak. I'm not sure if this is technically figurative language, but I like to think it is because it's sort of like an onomatopoeia because of the "zapped." I'm not exactly sure why, but I feel it is just very figurative. 

Quote: 

"... the resources were stunning--sparklers for fourth of July, colored eggs for Easter--it was the great American war chest--the fruits of science, the smokestacks, and the canneries, the arsenals at Hartford, the Minnesota forests, the machine shops, the vast fields of corn and wheat"(16) I thought this was a very interesting quote. Mostly because he mentioned Minnesota, but besides that I think that it also carries some significance. Here he is mentioning all the things the supply planes would drop to them, and how for war these are pretty luxurious

things to have dropped down to you. Also, all of the things that were dropped to them reminded him of America and his longing for America. At least that's how I interpret it. 

Theme: 

A theme of accepting death is emerging because it's better than being embarrassed. The soldiers would rather die then try and escape death and thought to be a "sissy"