Erich Maria Remarque and the Nature of War Essay

Unlike truly historical works emphasizing the benignant side of contend, for example, Cornelius Ryans The Longest Day or A connect Too Far, in which the author provides highly detailed bankers bills of historical eveningts by the eyes of participants leading to an objective treatment and analysis of those events, Erich Maria Remarques any unperturbed on the Western figurehead is a novelisation of the drive of Ger homosexual soldiers in globe War I. Remarque thus follows a literary line which includes William Shakespeares Henry V, Stephen Cranes The chromatic Badge of Courage, and Leo Tolstoys War and Peace and extends through with(predicate) cinematic efforts such as The Big Red One and The Hurt storage locker, which utilize historical context in order to examine the transformative genius of war on those most intimately involved. Each work examines a key theme, e.g., patriotism, cowardice, social change, brotherhood, etc., interwoven with and supported by details of unlike wars.The particular details chosen by the authors, with the possible exception of Tolstoy who evidently left nonhing out of his opus, are those lending support to that central theme. Thus, to at a lower step forwardstand the process used by Remarque in making his natural selection of which details of World War I to include in All Quiet on the Western Front, one moldiness first convey across his thesis and its origin. Referring to the biographical nones following the novel, we learn that Remarque was himself in combat during World War I, and was wounded five times, the last time very intemperately (Remarque, 1928, p. 297). That during the time of his service Remarque was near the age of his protagonist, chief city of Minnesota Baumer, suggests an autobiographical character to the novel and lends credence to the story that no second hand account could provide. Yet Remarque does not take the opportunity to provide clo for certain to his experience or to provide a set o f objective conclusions to the war.Drawing over again from the biographical notes, Remarque possessed intense determination to concentrate in his metaphor upon the worst horrors of the age, war and in servicemanity (Remarque, 1928, p. 297). Three major themes can be found within All Quiet on the Western Front combining to support Remarques ideology the legitimacy of statehood, the futility of war, and the dehumanizing effects of war. disposed his experiences and his viewpoint, what details did Remarque expound upon and to what purpose? In a discussionamong the soldiers as to the origins of the war, they openly question the authority by which war was declared. When Tjaden asks how wars begin, Albert answers, Mostly by one field badly offending another (Remarque, 1928, p. 205). Yet it is this conceit of country which perplexes the most. In Europes past, wars were fought over dis chuckes between small nation states by order and to the benefit of local rulers.This was clearly not the case in World War I, a fact not lost on the soldiers moreover what I would like to know, says Albert, is whether on that point would own been a war if the Kaiser had said No. Im sure on that point would, I (capital of Minnesota) interject, he was against it from the first (Remarque, 1928, p. 203). What the soldiers had not yet come to terms with was the rampant nationalism that had swept Europe. Rising from the Industrial Revolution, nurtured by the Atlantic revolutions, and spurred by the globalization of trade, Europeans of smaller states set aside their notions of subjects at a lower place a common ruling dynasty to a sense of unity among peoples kick back by blood, customs and culture. All of this encouraged political and cultural leadership to articulate an appealing of their particular nations and ensured a growing circle of people receptive to such ideas.Thus the idea of nation was constructed or even invented, but it was often presented as an awakening of olde r linguistic or cultural identities (Strayer, 2011, p. 797). Such were the notions the young schoolboys received from their overlord Kantorek who spoke of country and honor before shepherding them to their enlistment. Yet, when those identities failed to adequately address the cultures affected, as in Austria-Hungary, nationalism failed to suppress dissent. With the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian throne, by a Serbian nationalist, the system of rigid alliances established among the emerging nations plunged the realism into war (Strayer, 2011, p. 979). subsequently further reflection, the soldiers began to understand how they came to be in a war whose causes could not be satisfactorily explained by patriotism merelyState and home-country, theres a big difference. (Kat) But they go together, insists Kropp, Without the State there wouldnt be a home country (Remarque, 1928, p. 205). Remarque addresses the futility of war in various ways. He describes the effects of the materialadvantages of the Al lies throughout the war, specially following the entrance of American forces, foretelling defeat for Germany in a war of attrition Our lines are falling back. at that place are to a fault many fresh English and American regiments over there. Theres likewise a great deal corned beef and white wheaten bread. There are too many new guns. Too many aeroplanes. But we are emaciated and starved. Our food is bad and mixed with so much substitute stuff it makes us ill..Our artillery is fired out, it has too few shells and the barrels are so worn that they shoot falteringly and scatter so widely as even to fall on ourselves (Remarque, 1928, p. 280).Most tellingly, Remarque condemns the madness of trespass warfare which resulted in enormous casualties epoch gaining or losing only a few yards of muddy, blood-soaked ground (Strayer, 2011, p. 982). capital of Minnesotas Company engages in a protracted, vicious trench battle in Chapter Six in which they are first driven back in retreat, regain the lost ground after an hour to eat, and push forrard into the French trenches before realizing their new position is untenable. The fight ceases. We lose color with the enemy. We cannot stay here long but moldiness retire under cover of our artillery to our own position (Remarque, 1928, p. 117). In the end, it was everything ventured, nothing gained. The indiscernible loss of life on both sides and the indifference to the carnage is highlighted in his description of the battlefield itself. The mean solar days are hot and the dead lie unburied. We cannot fetch them all in, if we did we should not know what to do with them. The shells pass on sink them (Remarque, 1928, pp. 125-126).Lastly, Remarque relentlessly stresses the dehumanization of the soldiers throughout the course of the war. In his forward, Remarque makes his purpose for piece of music All Quiet on the Western Front clear It will try to simply tell of a generati on of men who, even though they may have escaped shells, were destroyed by the war (Remarque, 1928, p. i). The first step in the process comes with the realization that those shaping their futurity have done so with an agenda of their own. In speaking of Kantorek the schoolmaster and Corporal Himmelstoss, Paul reflects, For us lads of eighteen they ought to have been mediators and guides to the world of maturity, the world of work, of duty, of culture, of progress to the futurethe idea of authority, which they represented, was associated in ourminds with a greater acumen and a more humane wisdom. But the first death we proverb shattered this belief (Remarque, 1928, p. 12).The second phase in the downward ringlet is presented as the desensitization of the singular. Remarque portrays this through the soldiers continued bankers acceptance of the squalor of their condition. Through poor rations, living in mud fill trenches, and being in constant fear for their stretch forths fro m regular shelling associated with trench warfare and from the use of a deadly new weapon, mustard gas, Paul and his comrades develop a detached persona which shields them from their hideous reality well(p) as we turn into animals when we go up to the line, because it is the only thing which brings us through safely, so we turn into wags and loafer when we are restingWe want to live at any price so we cannot burden ourselves with feelings which, though they qualification be ornamental enough in peacetime, would be out of place here (Remarque, 1928, pp. 138-139). A third phase lies in the objectification of the soldier by others.Remarque best accomplishes this in his portrayal of medical treatment for the wounded. Early on, he establishes this premise through the death of Franz Kemmerich. A lack of supplies has denied him morphine to degrade his suffering. The higher than expected chance count has begun to turn doctors into processors of human sort One operation after another si nce five-oclock this morning. You know, today alone there have been sixteen deaths yours is the seventeenth. There will probably be twenty altogether (Remarque, 1928, p. 32). Kemmerichs body is quickly processed We must take him away at once, we want the bed. Outside they are manufacture on the floor (Remarque, 1928, p. 32). As the war drags on and casualties mount, the individual casualty becomes less a patient and more a number. Following an injury, Paul enters the hospital to learn of the latest advance in wartime triage A itsy-bitsy room at the corner of the building. Whoever is about to kick the bucket is put in there.There are two beds in it. It is generally called the demise Room. They dont have much work to do afterwards. It is more convenient, too, because it lies right beside the lift to the mortuary (Remarque, 1928, p. 257). Through his experience in the hospital, Paul comes to a stark realization, and Remarque drives home his point A man cannot greet that above such shattered bodies there are still human faces in which life goes its daily round. And this is only one hospital,one whiz station there are hundreds of curtilages in Germany, hundreds of thousands in France, hundreds of thousands in Russia. How vacuous is anything that can ever be written, done, or thought, when such things are possible. It must be all lies and of no account when the culture of a thousand years could not prevent this stream of blood being poured out, these torture-chambers in their hundreds of thousands. A hospital alone shows what war is (Remarque, 1928, p. 263).The ultimate phase is the passageway of the soldier from object to invisibility. Pauls death, and the matter if fact appearance in which Remarque presents it, stands in stark contrast to the official report of the day All quiet on the Western front. (Remarque, 1928, p. 296). The fate of a man has been subordinated to the fate of a nation without the nation realizing his sacrifice.Throughout All Quiet o n the Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque selects his details of World War I to support his themes decrying nationalism, the meaningless state of war, and the disintegration of the human spirit through the pursuit of warfare. No mention is made of specific battles or individual acts of heroism. The lack of specificity adds to the tone of the general, unyielding nature of war. Heroism, writ with a capital H, is a concept not to be found in Remarques world of war. In presenting his details of World War I, Remarque frame unyielding in his portrait of the destruction of the human condition on the altar of national pride.REFERENCESRemarque, E. M. (1928). All quiet on the western front. Ballantine Books. Strayer, R. W. (2011). shipway of the world a brief global history with sources, volume 2 Since 1500. 7th edition Bedford/St. Martins.