The Pain of Survivor’s Guilt

Survivors sometimes feel guilt over surviving a tragic even when others died. Joseph’s greatest pain is the guilt he feels because he survived the war and so many others, Suzy’s father particularly, did not. Martin uses Joseph’s story to describe why life back home is so hard even for veterans who have survived wars with little physical injury. Joseph’s unwillingness to tell Suzy the story of her father, even though he knows how badly she wants that information, demonstrates how painful it is to Joseph that he lived and Suzy’s father did not.

Suzy starts her radio show with the hope that she can connect with someone who can tell her what happened to her father. Her radio show brings comfort to other veterans and families of those veterans but she never gets the information she...