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The Jungle of Screaming Souls—where Kien is sent at the end of the Vietnam War to retrieve the corpses of missing soldiers—symbolizes the ways in which trauma and grief often lurk beneath the surface of life. The corpses themselves have sunk into the mud of the jungle, making them very difficult to find. In a way, then, it almost seems as if nothing tragic took place in the area. And yet, it’s Kien’s job to excavate the many bodies so that they aren’t forgotten, a task he comes to see as his “heavenly duty.” This “heavenly duty” isn’t just to drag bodies out of the mud: it’s to ensure that history bears witness to the atrocities that happened during the war. In the same way that the Jungle of Screaming Souls is full of ghosts and bodies despite looking completely unassuming, everyday life in Vietnam eventually resumes as if nothing happened. This discrepancy between the horror of what happened during the war and society’s odd sense of normalcy rankles Kien, ultimately driving him to write about his experiences in the war. In doing so, he essentially excavates the bitter reality of the war from society’s forgetful collective consciousness, dragging it out of obscurity in the same way that he once dragged corpses from the mud. In turn, the Jungle of Screaming Souls comes to represent how quickly and easily even the most monumental tragedies can fade away—unless, that is, people make the effort to keep the memory of such events alive.
The Jungle of Screaming Souls Quotes in The Sorrow of War
The The Sorrow of War quotes below all refer to the symbol of The Jungle of Screaming Souls. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Pages 3-8
Quotes
Even into early December, weeks after the end of the normal rainy season, the jungles this year are still as muddy as all hell. They are forgotten by peace, damaged or impassable, all the tracks disappearing bit by bit, day by day, into the embrace of the coarse undergrowth and wild grasses.
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Pages 8-26
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The name, age, and image of someone who’d been every bit as brave under fire as his comrades, who had set a fine example, suddenly disappeared without a trace.
Except within the mind of Kien. Can’s image haunted him every night, returning during the night to whisper to him by his hammock, repeating the final, gloomy lines he’d spoken by the stream. The whisper would turn into a suffocating gasp, like the sound of water blocking the throat of a drowning man.
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The Jungle of Screaming Souls Symbol Timeline in The Sorrow of War
The timeline below shows where the symbol The Jungle of Screaming Souls appears in The Sorrow of War. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Pages 3-8
...But the Remains-Gathering Team is unable to do much during the wet season, since the jungles are too muddy to trek through. It isn’t until December that Kien and the other...
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...in the dry season of 1969 found itself surrounded by enemy forces in this very jungle. Napalm coursed through the area and lit everything in a horrible blaze, trapping the members...
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...place in this area gave rise to many lost souls, which now flit through the jungle and moan, letting their cries carry on the wind. Their howls are the reason the...
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There are also civilian spirits in the Jungle of Screaming Souls . Long ago, there was a small village in the area, but it was consumed...
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Pages 8-26
...for instance, the period in which he and his fellow soldiers posted up near the Jungle of Screaming Souls for “political indoctrination.” They spent their days hearing about politics as their superiors spoke rapturously...
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...calling out in the night. He feels mystified by how different everything feels in this jungle, even though he was here just one year ago. He realizes that the difference doesn’t...
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Remembering the first time he and his fellow soldiers came to the Jungle of Screaming Souls , Kien thinks about what it was like to smoke rosa canina. The locals have...
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...the higher-ups banned the smoking of rosa canina, ordering the soldiers to go through the jungle and rip up the plants so that they wouldn’t grow ever again. Still, the flower...
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...the hours just before dawn. He has just heard a chilling cry coming from the jungle—a cry he has heard before. He heard it for the first time in this exact...
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Pages 26-44
One year ago, Kien’s unit came to this very place in the Jungle of Screaming Souls . They built small huts at the foot of the mountain that now towers over...
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...know why the commandos had bothered to kill the three women. They’d come to the jungle for Kien’s platoon, so why spend time brutally murdering innocent women? But the commandos didn’t...
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...knows what it’s like to dream of the many people who died here in the Jungle of Screaming Souls . The bodies they collect seem to come alive at night and tell their stories....
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Pages 44-56
...young woman he once knew named Hoa. He and Hoa knew each other in the Jungle of Screaming Souls in 1968. They only worked together for a short time, but he often has vivid...
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Pages 79-100
...gave the skeleton a real burial, the song burst forth and played loudly through the jungle one last time and then was never heard again. Whether or not this is true...
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...the Remains-Gathering Team swore they kept hearing crazed laughter in the same vicinity of the Jungle of Screaming Souls where Kien’s commander died. Kien didn’t mention the incident at first, but other members of...
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Pages 108-116
...remove—he mistook her for Phuong, for Hien, for Hoa (a woman he knew in the Jungle of Screaming Souls ), and even for the corpse from the Saigon airport.
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Pages 116-146
...one of the only people in Battalion 27 to survive a nasty fight in the Jungle of Screaming Souls , he managed to hobble through the landscape and meet up with some other soldiers,...
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Pages 146-200
...Cambodian border, where they might find some safety. As they made their way through the jungle, they crossed paths with a group of wounded soldiers who were also trying to get...
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Enemy troops were spread throughout the jungle, so it was incredibly unsafe for Kien and his men to find themselves locked in...
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Suddenly, Kien saw a large group of American soldiers walking through the jungle. He immediately ducked and pulled Hoa down behind him, hiding as the Americans progressed on...
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