Narrator and point of view

The short story “The Things They Carried” is told in the third-person by an anonymous narrator. The narrator follows the soldiers during their missions, but the narrative focus is on First Lieutenant Jimmy Cross.

The narrator has extensive knowledge regarding what Jimmy thinks and feels. For example, the following quotation reveals that the narrator knows what Jimmy thinks about Martha: “The letters weighed 10 ounces. They were signed Love, Martha, but Lieutenant Cross understood that Love was only a way of signing and did not mean what he sometimes pretended it meant.” (p. 1, ll. 16-19)

Also, the next quotation reveals that the narrator has insight into Jimmy’s private thoughts: “Slowly, a bit distracted, he would get up and move among his m...