The Things They Carried Blogpost on the First Four Stories

What is the significance of the way in which the third short story, Spin, is written?

Spin is interesting because, unlike the rest of the short stories in the novel, it is pretty much completely cut into chunks that only measure into paragraphs (some small, some large) that contain little anecdotes on the war that would themselves probably not warrant a greater story attached to them (this is except for the end story, which is about when O'Brien first killed a man, and a story later expands upon this). I think one reason why this was done this way because it's like a second beginning to the story. The Things They Carried has a duel focus on both all the men in Alpha Company and more specifically on Jimmy Cross; love, the second story, is focused on Jimmy Cross. Spin, the third story, begins the part of the book that focuses moderately evenly on all the other members of Alpha Company (at least to a point). It works by creating a web of events and happenings which the reader can then use for context when reading about other characters in later stories. It also gives off a disjointed feel as if you're jumping back and forth through time (which in a sense you are), which might help the leader start to loose themselves in the story, combining with the numbness that the first story provokes to create a more accurate feeling of what war was.