Sea duty

Abstract

This work deals with a confused young Marine during the Viet Nam era. But it is not political or ideological confusion that beleaguers and negates him after he enlists, and tries unsuccessfully to get to the war. The confusion is internal, and has grown out of his own human character, where an imaginative belief in the traditional meaning of honor and duty wars with a real willingness to believe in nothing. The external war in Viet Nam fades into the background as internal war, taking place inside the main character, comes to the foreground. In the end, this young Marine discovers that anything that is human is insecure, and is outlasted by the insidious indifference of time and history.