All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Remarque
All Quiet on the Western Front, written by Erich Remarque is a novel dealing with one young mans transformation from an average person into a hardened man that eventually turns away from the society that he once was a part of. Remarque wrote this novel to emphasize the disorder and chaos that is created in war. This sense of disorder was felt within the soldiers as well as the civilians that have no part in the fighting. Civilians often had a glamorous portrayal of war that was preached to many but it soon became a harsh reality, the horror for the many that saw it.
The novel centers on a young German soldier, Paul Baumer and his experiences throughout a period of World War I. The reality of the war and the horror that it truly is transformed Baumer very quickly. There were many false pretenses that Paul had been taught growing up in a “Hitleristic” society. He quickly adapted to war and the ways of it. Baumer transformed from a rather innocent romantic to a hardened and somewhat bitter veteran. He was changed for the worse by the war. He became disaffiliated with all icons or people that had been the foundation of his pre-enlistment days. Communication with his parents, friends, elders, as well as the recollection of school, and religion were lost. This rejection of society is fueled by the realization that the pre-enlistment society simply can not understand the reality of the Great War. Baumer then realizes that the only ones that can understand him are his comrades in the trenches. They become his new society and war his way of life.
Remarque shows Baumer’s disaffiliation from traditional society by showing his views on the language used by both the pr...
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...extbook in a boring class. Baumer never finds this peacefulness; rather he finds the urge to get back to the war and his comrades that were still there.
Remarque wrote a great novel, I would not consider this to be a universal novel. This shows the torments and terror of war but I do not think that you have a full feeling of the truth in it. Paul Baumer is a young man thrown into a world in which he thinks is a glorious thing but realizes that lies and trickery have led him to where he is. After all that Baumer goes through, he is left with the point of view that: war is war. It can not be defined; it can not even be discussed with any accuracy. It has no sense of feeling or personal emotion involved. War is its own being that is fueled by hatred. This is what Remarque’s purpose was in writing this novel, to show the disorder and chaos created by war.
“I am young, I am twenty years old; yet I know nothing of life but despair, death, fear, and fatuous superficiality cast over an abyss of sorrow. I see how peoples are set against one another, and in silence, unknowingly, foolishly, obediently, innocently slay one another (263).” Powerful changes result from horrifying experiences. Paul Baumer, the protagonists of Erich Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front utters these words signifying the loss of his humanity and the reduction to a numbed creature, devoid of emotion. Paul’s character originates in the novel as a young adult, out for an adventure, and eager to serve his country. He never realizes the terrible pressures that war imposes on soldiers, and at the conclusion of the book the empty shell resembling Paul stands testament to this. Not only does Paul lose himself throughout the course of the war, but he loses each of his 20 classmates who volunteered with him, further emphasizing the terrible consequences of warfare. The heavy psychological demands of life in the trenches and the harsh reality of war strip Paul of his humanity and leave him with a body devoid of all sentiment and feeling.
Erich Maria Remarque’s novel, All Quiet on the Western Front gives you detail and insight into the long, destructive “Great War”. Quickly, romantic illusions about combat are disintegrate. Enthusiastic teenage boys convinced to fight for their country by their patriotic teachers came back feeling part of a lost generation . This novel teaches us what a terrifying and painful experience World War I was for those fighting in the trenches on the front.
In a deep, muddy trench, a lone soldier lies, a silver bullet embedded in his abdomen. He clutches his side, screaming in pain, crying for help -- but no one is listening. The sky slowly darkens, and his voice becomes no more than a faint rasping, until it fades into nothingness. Millions of soldiers found themselves in similar situations during World War I, also known as the Great War, which involved multiple European powers; most notably, Germany, France, Britain, and Russia. Written from the perspective of Paul Baumer, a 19-year-old German soldier, All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque follows his journey as he is thrown into the chaos of World War I. At the warfront, Paul witnesses countless horrors that
Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front is a novel that takes you through the life of a soldier in World War I. Remarque is accurately able to portray the episodes soldiers go through. All Quiet on the Western Front shows the change in attitudes of the men before and during the war. This novel is able to show the great change war has evolved to be. From lining your men up and charging in the eighteenth century, to digging and “living” in the trenches with rapid-fire machine guns, bombs, and flame-throwers being exposed in your trench a short five meters away. Remarque makes one actually feel the fun and then the tragedy of warfare. At the beginning of the novel Remarque gives you nationalist feelings through pride of Paul and the rest of the boys. However at the end of the war Remarque shows how pointless war really is. This is felt when everyone starts to die as the war progresses.
All quiet On the Western Front, a book written by Erich Maria Remarque tells of the harrowing experiences of the First World War as seen through the eyes of a young German soldier. I think that this novel is a classic anti-war novel that provides an extremely realistic portrayal of war. The novel focuses on a group of German soldier and follows their experiences.
In the novel, the men have this sense of alienation that completely takes over them. They feel as though after the war, their life has become meaningless and unimportant, “A sense of alienation becomes overwhelming . . . The young soldiers feel cut off from their now- meaningless prewar existence, unable to visualize a future after the war . . .” (Armitage). Paul finds it difficult to imagine a life without war and to remember how he felt before the war. He feels uncomfortable wearing the attire any other normal man would wear on a daily basis. He feels as though he cannot live a normal life with a suit on, “I feel awkward. The suit is rather tight and short; I have grown in the army. Collar and tie give me some trouble” (Remarque 149.) Paul finds it difficult to speak with his family now since he has returned from war, “These requests all lead to Baumer’s alienation from life at home. . .As the war’s madness increases, home fades into alienation for Baumer” (Schileper). “Some men may even begin to doubt the purpose of their mission, question the reason they are fighting and distrust the justifications of their leaders . . .the more cold- blooded they become in their own thoughts and actions”
Remarque demonstrates Baumer's disaffiliation from the traditional by emphasizing the language of Baumer's pre- and post-enlistment societies. Baumer either can not, or chooses not to, communicate truthfully with those representatives of his pre-enlistment and innocent days. Further, he is repulsed by the banal and meaningless language that is used by members of that society. As he becomes alienated from his former, traditional, society, Baumer simultaneously is able to communicate effectively only with his military comrades. Since the novel is told from the first person point of view, the reader can see how the words Baumer speaks are at variance with his true feelings. In his preface to the novel, Remarque maintains that "a generation of men ... were destroyed by the war" (Remarque, All Quiet Preface). Indeed, in All Quiet on the Western Front, the meaning of language itself is, to a great extent, destroyed.
Through Baümer, Remarque examines how war makes man inhuman. He uses excellent words and phrases to describe crucial details to this theme. "The first bomb, the first explosion, burst in our hearts," (page #). Baümer and his classmates who enlisted into the army see the true reality of the war. They enter the war fresh from school, knowing nothing except the environment of hopeful youth and they come to a premature maturity with the war, their only home. "We were eighteen and had begun to love life and the world; and we had to shoot it to pieces. We are not youth any longer" (page #). They have lost their innocence. Everything they are taught, the world of work, duty, culture, and progress, are not the slightest use to them because the only thing they need to know is how to survive. They need to know how to escape the shells as well as the emotional and psychological torment of the war.
All Quiet on the Western Front is the story of Paul Baumer’s service as a soldier in the German army during World War I. Paul and his classmates enlist together, share experiences together, grow together, share disillusionment over the loss of their youth, and the friends even experience the horrors of death-- together. Though the book is a novel, it gives the reader insights into the realities of war. In this genre, the author is free to develop the characters in a way that brings the reader into the life of Paul Baumer and his comrades. The novel frees the author from recounting only cold, sterile facts. This approach allows the reader to experience what might have been only irrelevant facts if presented in a textbook.
Erich Remarque uses the character Paul Baümer to depict the image of war. All of the knowledge the reader acquires, of war and its effects on the men are through his thoughts and experiences. Due to this first
Paul and his company were once aspiring youth just graduating school thinking about having a wonderful life. Sometimes things don’t always play out the way you want. The effects of war on a soldier is another big theme in the novel. Paul describes how they have changed and how death doesn’t affect them anymore. “We have become wild beasts. We do not fight, we defen...
While soldiers are often perceived as glorious heroes in romantic literature, this is not always true as the trauma of fighting in war has many detrimental side effects. In Erich Maria Remarque 's All Quiet On The Western Front, the story of a young German soldier is told as he adapts to the harsh life of a World War I soldier. Fighting along the Western Front, nineteen year old Paul Baumer and his comrades begin to experience some of the hardest things that war has to offer. Paul’s old self gradually begins to deteriorate as he is awakened to the harsh reality of World War 1, depriving him from his childhood, numbing all normal human emotions and distancing future, reducing the quality of his life.
Throughout their lives, people must deal with the horrific and violent side of humanity. The side of humanity is shown through the act of war. This is shown in Erich Remarque’s novel, “All Quiet on the Western Front”. War is by far the most horrible thing that the human race has to go through. The participants in the war suffer irreversible damage by the atrocities they witness and the things they go through.
The story of several schoolmates who symbolize a generation destroyed by the dehumanisation of the First World War, All Quiet on the Western Front tells of the men who died, and the tragically changed lives of those who survived. Remarque follows the story of Paul Bäumer, a young infantryman, from his last days of school to his death three years later. Whereas the journey motif is typically used to portray a positive character development, that of Paul is deliberately the opposite. In what has been dubbed the greatest antiwar novel of all time, Remarque depicts the way in which Paul is snatched away from humanity by the brutality of war. However while Paul and his comrades become separated from society, and begin to rely on their basic survival instincts, in their own surroundings they still show humane qualities such as compassion, camaraderie, support and remorse. Paul’s transformation from human to soldier begins in training camp, and is reinforced by the trauma at the front. His return home further alienates him from society, and Paul begins to feel safe at the front with his friends. Nonetheless throughout the novel suffering and mortality bare Paul’s true side, and he momentarily regains his former self. Bäumer, the German word for tree, is an early indication that Paul must remain firmly rooted in reality to survive the brutality of war.
All Quiet on the Western Front follows the story of a young soldier named Paul who was enlisted at a young age to fight for his country. Remarque, being a German veteran from the Great War was compelled to write this novel to show the reality of war unlike other authors who write a story about war witho...