40 pages • 1 hour read
Tobias WolffPharaoh’s Army: Memories of the Lost War
Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 1994A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Class Mobility
Wolff’s memoir frequently explores class mobility and social status from the perspective of an outsider looking in, which ties into the theme of institutional and social norms and conventions. He is expelled from a prestigious prep school that he was only able to afford on scholarship (in part because he forged his credentials). After joining the military, he finagles his way into a role in the Special Forces and as an officer by presenting a firm disposition, despite struggling in his duties. While in language school, he dates Vera, the upper-class descendent of Russian aristocracy, and meets Pete Landon, a well-to-do, highly educated Foreign Service Officer. Ultimately, Wolff ends up at Oxford, yet another bastion of the well-off. It is worth mentioning that the nature of a con man like his father is to attempt to con their way into a richer lifestyle, one they cannot truly afford and one to which they do not truly belong.
However, the memoir deals with status largely from a perspective of disillusionment. For example, while Vera is from an aristocratic family, it is a deeply troubled one between her own outbursts and her brother’s refusal to leave his room over a minor incident. Landon, too, shrouds his condescension in an air of civility, hiding the fact that Wolff will never truly be one of Landon’s circle. His feelings of superiority are also on display when, on a whim, he tries to send Wolff to North Vietnam because he feels Wolff is not in enough danger. Then, there is the fact that Wolff’s father’s attempts to improve his station routinely get him into trouble; by the time Wolff sees him before heading to Vietnam, he is struck by how much life has worn his father down. As a result, Wolff flirts with status without seeking to fully acquire it—at least, not through traditional means.
Language
Language is an important motif for several reasons. Most obviously, Wolff is trained as a language specialist, so linguistic capability is important for his own personal story. When he is trained, it is presented as an important tool for the military operations. It is in his day-to-day operations that readers see the value of Wolff’s Vietnamese aptitude—or lack thereof. The fact that he is can communicate works well and helps him handle what he needs to handle; at the same time, the fact that he is not fluent precludes him from fully taking part in military operations. For instance, his inability to keep up with Major Chau and the other Vietnamese officers only slows down planning—a benefit and a curse, likely, for Wolff. Further, his aptitude is juxtaposed against Landon’s, whose superior knowledge of Vietnamese gives him access to important people and whose polyglottal abilities make Wolff jealous. On the other hand, Benet is persistently amazed by Wolff’s ability to speak Vietnamese at all, despite Benet’s own ability to code-switch between a variety of English vernaculars, to which Wolff can only begin to aspire.
Canh Cho
Wolff’s one-time Vietnamese pet serves both as a cultural marker and as a bookend for Wolff’s experience there. Wolff’s rather American reverence of dogs prevents him from even considering that the Vietnamese battalion might want to eat the stray rather than adopt him. The thought horrifies Wolff so much that he pays them for a dog he does not truly want in the first place—this despite the number of Viet Cong he has certainly killed and will kill in the future. Canh Cho returns periodically throughout the memoir, but his most important reappearance is on Wolff’s final day, when Major Chau has the dog made into a stew. Wolff is surprised, but not horrified, and decides to honor his former pet by eating him in his entirety—very different from his earlier views.
Timepieces
Two important timepieces bookend the novel. Earlier, Wolff is given a gold, engraved pocket watch by Vera, a family heirloom that becomes a symbol of luck for Wolff. He believes that he will survive the war as long as the watch continues to tick. Toward the end of the book, Wolff accepts an expensive Heuer chronograph from his father, a gift that reminds the reader of the shifting nature of truth. Wolff’s father likely did not pay for the watch, as he would not have been able to afford it, and yet Wolff appreciates the gift anyway, choosing to consider its purported value rather than what—or whether—his father paid for it. Both watches, as a result, are heirlooms in a way, both given as gifts by people who, for Wolff, have faded away into time.
Mỹ Tho
The village of Mỹ Tho functions as an interesting symbol for the memoir. Most literally, it demonstrates power and control—whichever side controls it, as the South Vietnamese mostly do, holds power in that region. However, it also functions as representative of and against colonialism more broadly. The town is modeled after European villages, thus itself having a legacy of colonialism, but the fact that Americans have largely been banned from the town suggests an anti-colonial measure of control. Further, though, the Viet Cong demonstrate their power by secretly infiltrating the town—an important moment in which the Vietnamese infiltrate a French-colonial town, returning it, even if only temporarily, to Vietnamese control.
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By Tobias Wolff
