DEAR AMERICA CHARACTER COMPARISONS

Dear America
Character Comparison Chart
Characters: Rodney Chastant Frederick Downs
George Olsen Marion Lee “Sandy” Kempner

Similarities
Differences
-All of them are fighting voluntarily
-They all use slangs such as ‘dinks, Charlie’
-They all are glad to receive letters
-They all talk about their experiences on the field except for Rodney
-They talk about the harsh conditions they go through when carrying out missions
-They try to use metaphors in their letters to try and give their readers a slight understanding of what they are going through
-None of them wanted the ‘Purple Heart’ medal/award
-They are all proud of what they do
-All of them except Rodney had commented on how incompetent the higher ups are

-Rodney never told his parents about his experiences in Vietnam
-They have different roles from each other
-Fred has expressed in his letters on how much he hates the dinks.
-Sandy is very sarcastic about the meaning of “success” in a successful mission
-Only Fred survived the war


All of the main characters know why they are fighting and are doing it on their own free will. Among the four characters, Rodney Chastant is the most dedicated as he voluntarily extended his stay in Vietnam. Though most of them died, Fred Downs, the only survivor also suffered a major injury; his left arm was cut off and will have to make do with an artificial replacement. They are all proud on what they do and had no regrets on their actions.

The main characters have written a great deal about their missions; the weather, the exchange of fires, casualties etc. They used allot of metaphors in their letters to try and express their feelings or to simply give their addressees a small idea of what they are going through during their missions. The words “like” and “same” were commonly used to compare things.

All of the main characters are very disappointed with their higher-ups. They commented on the lack of competency of their superiors; “If there’s one thing I can’t abide, it’s an arm-chair leader who sends his men off to die on hopeless, meaningless operations.” (P.98 George Olsen).

Even all of these, Rodney Chastant still thinks that there is a small light up far ahead. Of the four men, only Rodney showed signs of positive thinking about the war. Sandy was the complete opposite of him since Sandy only focused on the wrong done by the Americans.

By Kimbo the Great