Fallen Angels

1. Fallen Angels By: Walter Dean Myers We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother…

2. Walter Dean Myers • Famous African American writer • Born in West Virginia on August 12, 1937 • Mother died when he was two • In the 5th grade he discovered his love for reading and began writing daily in the 7th grade • He loved to play basketball • At age 17 he joined the army– he saw it as an opportunity to escape Harlem • He had a brother that died in the war

3. Vietnam on Television

4. Vietnam was the first "television war." • What was the effect of television on the development and outcome of the war? • For better or for worse it was an anti-war influence. It brought the "horror of war" night after night into people's living rooms and eventually inspired revulsion and exhaustion. The argument has often been made that any war reported in an unrestricted way by television would eventually lose public support. • In the early years, when morale was strong, television reflected the upbeat tone of the troops. But as withdrawals continued and morale declined, the tone of field reporting changed. • The search for action footage also meant it was a dangerous assignment: nine network personnel died in Indochina, and many more were wounded.

5. Big Ideas of Fallen Angels: • Themes are the fundamental and often universal ideas explored in a literary work. Loss of Innocence Unromantic Reality of War Randomness of War Meaning of War Unity in Adversity Disparity between the War and “the World”

6. Big Ideas 1. The Unromantic Reality of War • Illusions about what war is like: • Learned about war from movies and stories that portray battle as heroic and glorious • The army as efficient and organized

7. In Reality… • The army is highly inefficient and fallible • Most of the officers are far from heroic, looking out only for their own lives and careers rather than the lives of their soldiers. • Often inadvertently kill their allies • The battles and military strategies of the war are disorganized and chaotic

8. 2. The loss of innocence • Title- emphasizes the theme of youth and innocence. • The novel is first and foremost a tale of the lost innocence of a squad of soldiers in the Vietnam War. • Average age of a soldier fighting is 19… Just out of high school-- they have not had any life experiences- the characters talk about drinking, making love to a women, and even growing a mustache– they have not experienced any of these things • The war quickly changes them • Surrounded by death, they are forced to contemplate the fragility of • their own lives • Stripped of the carelessness and brazenness of youth. • Where they want to see only a separation between right and wrong, they instead find moral ambiguity. Where they want to see order and meaning, they find only chaos and senselessness. Where they want to find heroism, they find only the selfish instinct of self-preservation.

9. 3. Randomness of War: • Because most of the soldiers and officers just want to get out alive, many of them make careless mistakes while faced with fear • War is not based on skill; death is unfair and random, often a matter of pure chance. • Going into the war you want to believe that the good, smart, and cautious soldiers always survive while enemies, unskilled soldiers, and morally bad people die.

10. 4. Disparity between the war and “the World” • Soldiers feel that they are unable to communicate with their families and loved ones because they are afraid that their family will fail to empathize or understand, since they will cling to the comforting myths they have always embraced • Video: talked about how everyone at home was crying over MLK, JFK and the Kent State students… It made the soldiers wonder “what about us?” • Fears that family might think poorly of him for failing to live up the unrealistic ideal of the war hero.

11. 5. Unity in Adversity • Even though these young men all have different backgrounds, they are able to come together to face the horrors of war • 6. Meaning of War • Because of the Randomness of War, it makes some of the characters question the morality of war itself and the reasons for fighting. • Most of them think they know why they are there at the beginning, but slowly they start to lost their grip on reality and the reasons for fighting this war • In traditional Christian theology, devils are angels who have fallen; the characters worry that the US forces may also become “fallen”, despite their good intentions.

12. Critical Response • “Myers smoothly evokes the tension, anxiety and fear that grip the recruits, while allowing his main characters to emerge as interesting, complex people rather than just stereotypical soldiers.” • The New York Times Book Review • January 22, 1989 • “Other authors have gotten the details right, but Myers…reaches into the minds of the soldiers and readers are startled to remember that these were teenagers, thrown into battle against other teenagers (and their families), surrounded by an enemy that was invisible. • Publishers Weekly • May 13,1988