Epistrophe-- ... a scholar, maybe (Ch. 12)

When the author is describing the man that he killed, he portrays him as a harmless young man. I do not know whether the man looked as the author said or whether it was a guilty conscience, but the way that he writes suggests a conscience that, after three decades, is still affected by the man. The author repeats "a scholar, maybe" twice after the description of the young man to stress the fact that the man does not belong in the war, not unlike some of the American boys. The author is slightly distraught in seeing that he killed this man and I believe that he sees it more as murder because of the looks. The author, Tim O'Brien, imagines a whole life for this man with a family, and a girlfriend, and as a student. I think that he sees himself a little in the man. He is more muscled and experienced, but he graduated summa cum laude and was excepted into Harvard for graduate school. The author was a scholar, just like the man, but he was hardened, experienced, but still did not, in his heart, belong.