NOTHING NEW

I have a morbid fascination for WW1 - The Great War (there's an oxymoron for you) - particularly the Western Front.
I will read every book I can find, watch every movie/documentary, and I've visited most of the battleground sites and museums. Mrs P has even got the t-shirt...I kid you not!
So when I was doing an inventory of my athenaeum
the other day (shifting boxes in the attic), and I came across All Quiet on the Western Front, I thought I'd have another read.

** I'm sure most people know the story of All Quiet on the Western Front, but just in case, the following section contains spoilers.


• The Plot •

The story is told in the first person by the narrator - a young man called Paul Baumer - who, along with the rest of his 18 year-old classmates, is swept up in the nationalistic phobia of the time. They are pressurized and badgered by their schoolmaster until they sign-up en-masse, full of patriotic fervour and enthusiasm, but they are quickly brought down to earth with a bang (no puns intended).
Most of the text is told in anecdotal form, there is no clear story running through, but a series of incidents interspersed with flashbacks and Paul's contemplations.

As one after another, his comrades die horrifying deaths, Paul knows that the soldiers will never be the same again. This is made all the more obvious to him when he returns home during a two week leave. His mother, who is dying of cancer, is curious about the war and asks how bad it really is, but he knows he can't tell her the details and just shrugs it off.
He feels isolated while away from the front. He can't communicate with those who haven't experienced the utter futility and the carnage close-up. His paradox is that although he loathes and detests the battlefield, it is the only place he feels at home and he longs to return.
Not only is it the place where he feels most 'comfortable', it is also where the only people he can relate to are - his comrades, and especially Kat, an older man who has taken the youngsters under his wing.
Baumer tells us of his relationship with Kat - he loves him. They have an unspoken understanding...a closeness that two lovers could never have.

One of the most famous passages in the book is when Paul, while out on patrol, is stranded and has to shelter in a shell-hole in 'No Man's Land' after a French attack commences. At some point, a French soldier jumps in the hole and Paul stabs him in the throat. He doesn't die until the next evening and all the while stares in wide-eyed terror at Paul, who continually tells him he's sorry and tries to justify his action, while doing his best to comfort the Frenchman in his final, agonizing hours.

After a spell in hospital with a leg wound, and some leave, Paul returns to the front in late summer 1918. As the days grow shorter and the weather cooler, he watches as his friends all die, the hardest to bear being when Kat dies while Paul is carrying him to a field hospital.
At last he is alone.....

The final passage in the book is written by some unknown person who relates how Paul was found on a day when there is nothing much to report* -- "when they turned him over you could see that he could not have suffered long - his face looked as if he were 'almost' happy that it had turned out that way."

* The original, German title of the book is: Im Westen nichts Neues.....which translates to: In the West, Nothing New.


• Not The Plot •

This is a powerful story which pulls no punches and vividly highlights the dark side of war. It is not a memoir - although he did draw on his own experiences; and it is not an historical account - although it sometimes reads like one.
It is a novel written through the eyes of one young soldier....a novel about, "a generation that was destroyed by the war - even those who survived the shelling."
There are few military or historical details, no heroic deeds, and very little references to the 'enemy'.
It is a dark and sombre, despondent and depressing book but therein lies it's greatness as the ultimate anti-war novel.

To be fair, there are moments when the soldiers have a bit of fun, but the narrator stresses how gallows humour is employed to stave off their darker thoughts. It's impossible to think too deeply about what is going on....it would drive you mad.

Some of Paul's observations while under extreme conditions are truly insightful - though fatalistic, and he returns to the theme many times that if the people at home had any inkling of what it was really happening, it might...would...MUST stop.

Another feature of the book is the lack of any antagonistic feelings toward the French/British soldiers facing them. He comes to realize that they must surely be just the same as him. Boys, for the most part, indoctrinated and mercilessly thrown into the meat-grinder of the Western Front. They are quickly disillusioned and soon come to the realization that the real enemy is not the individuals opposing them, but war itself. This does not stop them hacking each other to bits at every available opportunity though...far from it.

The style of writing in this book is remarkable (no pun intended). It gives the impression of being very simplistic, naive almost - as though it were the scribblings in a journal by an averages young soldier of the time, but this only serves to enhance the quality of the prose. Scratch the surface, and you realize that the syntax is in fact, masterful.
"Shells, gas clouds and flotillas of tanks - crushing, devouring, death.
Dysentry, influenza, typhus - choking, scalding, death.
Trench, hospital, mass grave - there are no other possibilities."

There is no shortage of gore, of unspeakable horror, of gut-wrenching carnage - particularly the passage when Paul and his mates take shelter from an artillery barrage in a recently commissioned military cemetery and are showered in body parts from the dead....some fresh, and some not so fresh. But it is written in such a matter-of-fact manner, with no attempt at sensationalism, that it is far more chilling, and disturbing, than any gothic horror novel could ever be.

The following quote gives a good illustration of the pathos the author employs to such great effect:

"Müller is dead. He got a Verey light in the stomach from close to. He lived for another half-hour, fully conscious and in terrible agony. Before he died he gave me his pay-book and passed on his boots - the ones he inherited from Kemmerich that time. I wear them, because they are a good fit. Tjaden will get them after me - I've promised him."





• The Author •

Erich Maria Remarque was born in Osnabrück, Lower Saxony and, in 1916, was drafted into the German army at the age of 18. He was wounded at Passchendaele (Third Ypres). It was while he was in hospital that his mother died.
Remarque began his writing career as a sporting journalist, and assistant editor of Sportbild. This, his first novel, was an instant success when published in 1929 as it touched a nerve and was recieved with great empathy.
In 1933, all Remarque's books were banned by the Nazis as they felt it showed the glorious German soldier in a lees than favourable light, and this one was consigned to be publicly burnt. In 1938 Remarque lost his German citizenship, and he left Germany, first to Switzerland and later to the United States, with the help of his great friend, Marlene Dietrich He died in Locarno, Switzerland on September 25, 1970.


This book is a 'must-read', especially for anyone who thinks there is any glory in any war.



* All quotes (in italics) are from the book, ©Erich Maria Remarque.




Further reading on the theme of The Great War:

Ypres - The WW1 sites in and around this tragic city.
Dulce et Decorum Est Pro Patria Mori - A visit to the Somme battlefield and the monument to the missing.
The Good Soldier Švejk - A very different account of WW1, hilariously poignant.
Birdsong - A romantic novel set in Flanders during WW1



Thanks for reading



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