All_Quiet_on_the_Western_Front_Dialectical_Journal

All Quiet on the Western Front | Dialectical Journal | Nathan Rosenblatt A-1/2 5/5/11 | Foreword “It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped shells, were destroyed by the war.” Pg.18 “Yes, that’s the way they think, these hundred thousand Kantoreks! Iron Youth! Youth! We are none of us more than twenty years old.” Pg.24 “Together with Kropp, Westhus, and Tjaden I have stood at attention in a hard frost without gloves for a quarter of an hour at a stretch while Himmelstoss watched for the slightest movement of our bare fingers on the steel barrel of the rifle.” Pg.26 “We became hard, suspicious, pitiless, vicious, tough- and that was good; for these attributes were just what we lacked.” The book starts off by stating that it isn’t an adventure or a war novel, but will simply try to demonstrate the horrors of war and the “lost generation”. The author is not writing a book for the enjoyment of the reader or to write a tale of young men on an adventure. Most war novels make death and enjoyment to a person sitting on a chair reading a book but instead this book will show the true horrors of death and the side of war that nationalism does not show. I think that Remarque hated war and disliked nationalists. They ignorantly speak of hero’s with no true facts of the horrors. They do not understand the pain and hardships that they go through and there are so many of them that die, and so many of them are forgotten. They are too young to be heroes. This passage relates to me. Practicing everyday afterschool from the start of Fall and ending in the Spring, we did not quit. We did it for the sake of parade and ceremony but they did it for the sake of their sadistic commander. I remember standing at attention holding a cold rifle alongside classmates like Justin, David, and Levi as still as statues like them in the cold Korean winters. Only we had gloves and they had nothing. Their training was tough and merciless. They needed it though. They would die without their training. They entered their training as children but they leave as men. They need to be as hard as rock and as resolute as steel otherwise they would crumble to dust in the hardships of war. In a way, Himmelstoss saved their lives. Pg.41 “Give ‘em all the same grub and all the same pay and the war would be over and done in a day” Pg.49 “’Revenge is black-pudding.’ Himmelstoss ought to have been pleased; his saying that we should educate one another had borne fruit for himself. We had become successful students of his method.” Pg.80 “’And you, Detering!’ asks Muller like an inquisitor. He;s a born schoolmaster with all his questions.” Pg.88 “We believe in such things no longer, we believe in the war.” In the Army, the system as stated in the book is all based on one person telling another what to do. There is always somebody who is higher than you. If everyone was equal, whatever issue one king had with another would be sorted with the two kings, not millions of innocent lives. Maybe war really should be a festive event where two leaders fight it out while everybody watches. It sounds like a good idea to me. The beating of Himmelstoss, which went beyond a prank to a cruel merciless beating showed that they were capable of the same sadism as their commanding officers. Himmelstoss was whipped and partially suffocated. The young recruits matched Himmelstoss’ sadism and showed no mercy. This particular passage has situational irony where Himmelstoss’ teachings are used on him. It also shows the true colors of the recruits and especially Haie who really lashed out on Himmelstoss. This passage hit me as what Muller could have been. This lost generation could be contributing to society. They could have been anything. They had their whole lives ahead of them but instead they got sucked into the trenches to die. If they were to survive, what future could they have' Their lives were gone as soon as they stepped into the front lines. No longer are they humans, they are animals of the trenches. The book often refers to their animal like nature in the battlefield and that especially is what kept him alive. They don’t believe in society, they believe in the war. They aren’t like normal people, they have been brought up to society through school but it is all gone. They are soldiers and nothing more thanks to the war. Thanks to Kantorek. Pg.94 “We sit opposite one another, Kat and I, two soldiers in shabby coats, cooking a goose in the middle of the night. We don’t talk much, but believe we have a more complete communion with one another than even lovers have.” Pg.100 “the others jest too, unpleasant jests but what else can a man do'—the coffins are really for us, the organization surpasses itself in that kind of thing.” Pg.113 “We have become wild beasts. We do not fight, we defend ourselves against annihilation. It is not against men that we fling our bombs, what do we know of men in this moment when death is hunting us down—now, for the first time in three days we can see his face, now for the first time in three days we can oppose him. Paul and his friends are continually growing closer. How can multiple brushes with death with friends not make you close with them' This book doesn’t just show the horrors of war but the intensity of the soldiers friendships. Remarque shows that a civilian friendship such as two lovers cannot reach the connection that two soldiers feel with one another. The only part of the book that is romanticized is this passage. The rest of the book unlike most war novels does not romanticize anything. It shows the truth. I have no idea what I would do in that situation. I cannot think about my own coffin or my own tombstone. I am and they were too young for death and yet they look upon piles and piles of coffins waiting to be filled. It is a horrifying thought. I guess really the only thing to do is joke around to get your mind off of that saddening thought. I am not strong enough to go through that kind of emotional drama. If I were in his shoes, I would have long ago gone mad. The book as stated in the forewords, was not meant to be a novel or an adventure of boys in war, but the true face of trench warfare. The battles are not romanticized with glory, triumph, and patriotism but instead Remarque shows how terrifying it can be. The reader sits in a chair reading this book while men are fighting like animals to stay alive. The war was supposed to be to sides fighting for victory but to the men inside the frontlines, it is a battle to stay alive. You must do anything to stay alive even if it meant losing yourself in the war and becoming wild. They had deaths hand on their shoulders and deaths face looming in front of them but they keep on fighting it off. They feel for the first time they can truly do something to fight back at it and they lose themselves in the fury. Pg.122 “And even if these scenes of our youth were given back to us we would hardly know what to do. The tender, secret influence that passed from them could not rise again. We might be amongst them… but it would be like gazing at the photograph of a dead comrade.” Pg.123 “We are forlorn like children, and experienced like old men, we are crude and sorrowful and superficial—I believe we are lost.” Pg.132 “’Get out!’ I spit. He does not stir, his lips quiver, his moustache twitches.” After going through numerous terrors of war, their past lives seem so empty. His home is no longer his home. The trench is. His life depends on how well he lives in the trench. When I am in camp, looking back on home seems so weird. When I get home everything is so odd, no more schedule, I become accustomed to a new way of life. Paul is feeling that. He is gone so long from his normal life that to go back is odd. He has become accustomed to war and the life of the soldier. The things that once comforted him and were his refuge and his sanctuary are no more. Kat, Kropp, Tjaden, and all the rest of his friends are his life. This passage makes me think of the lost generation, especially because it says “I believe we are lost.” They are young like children but they have experienced enough hardships for many lifetimes and those hardships are the only thing they will ever know. The lost generation has nothing. They live just to reach their death. Other writers that helped give a voice to this generation were Hemmingway, Fitzgerald, and Stein. They all wrote to this generation to give it a voice. The irony of this passage is so amazing. The war showed everyones true colors. Himmelstoss, the cruel sadistic man was actually a coward. He trains young men to the front lines but when faced by the front lines, he cries and cowers in the face of death, the place in which he sends many young men. Pg.149 “We have left our boots at the door, they have given us slippers instead, and now nothing remains to recall for me the assurance and self-confidence of the soldier; no rifle, no belt… yet, in spite of all, I feel somewhat afraid.” Pg.160 “…I cannot feel at home amongst these things. There is my mother, there is my sister, there my case of butterflies, and there the mahogany piano—but I am not myself there. There is a distance, a veil between us. Pg.169 “They are different men here, men I cannot properly understand, whom I envy and despise.” Paul is finally entering a normal adolescent experience. For any other teen, they would be bubbling with glee but he is afraid. He has faced death head on but he is afraid of this. As a soldier he always had something to grasp. He had his rifle, and his uniform to hold onto that makes him a man but with it all behind the door, he has nothing to grasp. He is afraid to go without it. The military is all he can think about. He should be happy to finally have a regular civilian experience but he is so gone from a regular life it is scary. This veil is the war. He had to shroud himself in it in order to survive but now it cannot come off. Perhaps it would go away after time but he could not take the few weeks he would spend at home. The distance is too great for him and he cannot stay home. Everything that defined him like the piano and the case of butterflies is no more. Now it is only a rifle and a tunic. The veil is too heavy for him to bear and he must go back to what truly makes him feel at home. While he is in a bar, he begins to talk to a group of German men. They talk of glory and the war. They are nationalists. They puff on their cigars and sip their wine while Paul’s friends are being blown to bits and taken on a stretcher. He feels an emotional conflict wishing he could be as carefree as them but is angry that some men would sit around while children die in trenches. They are truly different men. Pg.176 “That is barely two years ago—and now here stands Territorial Kantorek, the spell quite broken, with bent knees, arms like pothooks, unpolished buttons and that ludicrous rig-out—an impossible soldier” Pg.183 “’Ah! Mother, Mother! Let us rise up and go out, back though the years, where the burden of all this misery is on us no more, back to you and me alone, Mother!’” Pg.204 “’Then I haven’t any business here at all,’ replies Tjaden, ‘I don’t feel myself offended’ A lot of irony is shown throughout this book. What would I do in his situation' I would definitely enjoy it. Kantorek the once powerful nationalist and endorser of war who called Paul and his friends the Iron Youth as they suffered in the trenches was now broken down and feeling what it truly is like to be in war. He romanticized it making it glorious and beautiful to be called on by ones country but now he is called upon and I don’t think he can handle it. Fate has odd ways of handling people. One reason Paul really hated being home was he was reminded of his mother. How she has cancer and is dying. He cannot handle both the war and his mother. She loves him so much and he loves her and he wishes he could just be a child once more to lay in her lap and cry or to just hold her and die with her instead of by himself in a trench. The people in the war had no true reason to fight. The people Paul, Kat, Tjaden, Kropp, and the rest of them had no actual issue with the French. They just fight because that’s what they are told to do. Later in the book when Paul kills the French man and says how he would never have done it if he had not scared him or how they would be friends if not for the damned war, really connected with this passage. This passage also reminds me of the book 1981 by George Orwell how the war rages between 3 powers, and the sides constantly change. The people have nothing to hate about the other side but the propaganda forces them to. If not for the war, wouldn’t life be great' Too bad that human nature is inclined to war Pg.193 “Their life is obscure and guiltless; if I could know more of them, what their names are… than my emotion would have an object and might become sympathy.” Pg.202 “’And would a king have to stand up stiff to an emperor'’” Pg.234 “Then we begin to realize we are in for trouble. The observation balloons have spotted the smoke from our chimney, and the shells start to drop on us.” Pg.259 “He operates on you for flat feet, and there’s no mistake, you don’t have them anymore; you have club feet instead, and have to walk all the rest of your life on sticks.” Their life is obscure and guiltless just as is the life of a soldier. If he had known his enemies, I doubt he would have killed any of them. The people who started the war don’t want him to know about them so that they could fight easily. If everybody in a war knew each other, how would it change' I am sure it would be thousands of times smaller. This is an interesting question asked by Tjaden. It made me think about where is the line where formalities are dropped. Some people are so separated from the masses, like a king and the people fighting for him, that there is no point in being formal to one another. It reminds me of aristocrats in the French Revolution. 2 aristocrats may be friendly to each other but if a peasant speaks, all hell breaks loose. This part of the book was a nice break from the constant war and turmoil that Paul feels. The book spares no detail and pulls no punches when describing a horror and when finally describing a peaceful day of cooking up a couple of swine and frying up some potato cakes, it was kind of nice. Another part of war that Remarque shows is the never ending nervousness. No matter what, you are not safe. They finally enjoy a peaceful day of good food and shelter but it is broken once more by shells. This part of the book I did not completely understand. I had no idea and don’t know if it’s true what Josef has said about war surgeons. They use wounded men as live cadavers to employ medical experiments. If it is true that’s absolutely appalling! I really felt some emotion after reading this chapter. That would be just cruel. Pg.260 “They have taken him and amputated his leg. The whole leg has been taken off from the thigh. Now he will hardly speak any more. Once he says he will shoot himself the first time he can get hold of his revolver again.” Pg.261 “Day after Day goes by with pain and fear, groans and death gurgles. Even the Death Room is no use anymore, it is too small; fellows die during the night in our room. They go even faster than the sisters can cope with them.” I understand why he hates being a cripple. This passage connected to me. The most important thing in my life is to enjoy it, and it should be to everybody. Well the thing that makes my life enjoyable is skateboarding. Obviously it would be hard without a leg. I would not go as far to shoot myself so this passage might be a hyperbole but who knows what war can do to a man. In later pages, Paul begins to describe a private who stabbed himself with a fork in the chest. I would despise living if I had lost my leg, but there are other ways to not be 100% miserable. I still feel sympathy towards Albert but also amazement in his hatred of his condition. A metaphor and a personification on death are in this passage. Remarque often uses death everywhere throughout the story. The horrifying sounds of the infirmary are given an owner. Death. All throughout the book death is spread. In most war novels, death is glorified and laughed at. It is so common in this book but Remarque writes about it in such a way that each death is sympathized even though so many die each chapter, passage, and paragraph. Death’s hand never stops creeping no matter where Paul goes, and when he finally gets away from it when he goes home, he wants to go back. Death is all he knows. He has become familiar with death. Pg.263 “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. I see that the keenest brains of the world invent weapons and words to make it yet more refined and enduring.” Pg.267 “… A soldier shot to a cripple, and there is his wife; who knows when he will see her again' He wants to have her, and he should have her, good.” This part of the passage summarizes Paul’s life as one of the Lost Generation. I cannot imagine a life in his position. To know nothing but war and to have nobody to go back to but his sister and his dying mother is condemnable. Earlier in the book he and his friends talked about what kind of future endeavors they would take. They were all so happy but only half of them are actually alive. If it were me, I would have just attempted to continue in a military career but he doesn’t seem to think of it. He only thinks of the horror or war. I assume that Remarque does this on purpose to demonstrate the empty lives of the Lost Generation. He uses Paul to talk about how war affects the “Iron Youth” and always the negative effects. He also in this passage, talks about how the soldiers fight against each other “in silence, unknowingly, foolishly, obediently, innocently slay one another.” They fight because the way the military works, is a King or a President, or an Emperor tells one man to fight, who tells another, who tells another, who tells another etc. all the way down from generals to privates. Blindly killing one another because somebody has a beef with something or someone. This passage touched me a lot. It made me think about who is the man who is worse off' The man with something to lose, or the man with nothing to win. The man with a family has something to go back to but so much to lose. The man with no family has nothing to lose, and nothing to go home to. Their lives are hard. This man is very very lucky to see his wife and child with only an amputated leg. How great it must feel to see his child and wife. Pg.272 “It is this, for example, that makes Tjaden spoon down his ham-and-pea soup in such tearing haste when an enemy attack is reported, simply because he cannot be sure that in an hour’s time he will be alive” Pg.279 “Before he died he handed over his pocket book to me and bequeathed me his boots—the same that he once inherited from Kemmerich. I wear them for they fit me quite well after me Tjaded will get them, I have promised them to him.” Pg.281 “’ I already have a wooden leg, but when I go back again and they shoot off my head, then I will get a wooden head made and become a staff surgeon.’”