I'll just put it out there and state this is quite simply the best book about war. Ever.
A visit to relatives one weekend gave the opportunity to raid their bookshelves where I stumbled upon the 200 page or so All Quiet On The Western Front. I could do that in a weekend I thought so I put aside the book I brought and dived in.
And boy next time I emerged was I shellshocked from the heartbreak I had just read. Remarque describes the book as:
"Neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it. It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped (its) shells, were destroyed by the war."
I have read quite a few war books in my time yet none of them has touched me quite as much as this has. The quality of the writing was such that I never once stopped to think, yeah but I'm reading from the viewpoint of a German soldier. I never once thought of lead character Baumer as the enemy, he was merely a young boy made into a man in the most horrific of circumstances. He could have been English, French or Martian it didn't matter. I loved the section where the men are discussing why they are at war - how they argue that one country can't insult another country, a German mountain can't insult a French one, it is the 'State' (and a few men who could have said no) that decides to go to war and yet because of the State, French locksmiths are shooting at German farmers. Remarque noted how school masters and drill instructors were these boy soldiers real enemies yet put them in front of nameless Russian soldiers and they will shoot them.
The book hits you in the face right from the get go. A seemingly happy moment of double rations, tobacco and cigarettes is revealed to be as a result of half of the regiment being killed during the night. The fact that Baumer and his friends choose to see the extra food in their bellies as a win as opposed to fixating on their fellow soldiers deaths shows the level of suffering they have previously gone through.
Baumer goes on to explain the difficulty he and his ex classmates experience when thinking of life away from the War. Leaving home for the first time to face life in the trenches with no life experience, no job, house, wife or children to anchor them. Their link to the outside world is limited to that of their parents at a time when ties between parents and teenagers are weakest. There is very little then to connect them to the world they are fighting for or to keep them motivated in believing that life as they know it will get better.
"We were eighteen and had begun to love life and the world; then we had to shoot it to pieces."
The book is gut wrenching, from the bombings and the injuries to the simple yet devastating final paragraph. The brutalities of War are so expertly captured by Remarque that the book became one of the first books burnt by the Nazis, with Remarque accused of exaggerating the horrors to further his pacifist agenda. I'm so pleased it survived.
This month I have read three books about or including World War One, so fitting given that it's November 2018. It's not only the best of the three, it's the best war book I have ever read. Ever.
The link for the book takes you to the Global Education Trust a charity aimed at making reading accessible to all. They have a branch in the town my relatives lived, we visited and purchased all of our poppies there. Go check them out.
A visit to relatives one weekend gave the opportunity to raid their bookshelves where I stumbled upon the 200 page or so All Quiet On The Western Front. I could do that in a weekend I thought so I put aside the book I brought and dived in.
And boy next time I emerged was I shellshocked from the heartbreak I had just read. Remarque describes the book as:
"Neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it. It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped (its) shells, were destroyed by the war."
I have read quite a few war books in my time yet none of them has touched me quite as much as this has. The quality of the writing was such that I never once stopped to think, yeah but I'm reading from the viewpoint of a German soldier. I never once thought of lead character Baumer as the enemy, he was merely a young boy made into a man in the most horrific of circumstances. He could have been English, French or Martian it didn't matter. I loved the section where the men are discussing why they are at war - how they argue that one country can't insult another country, a German mountain can't insult a French one, it is the 'State' (and a few men who could have said no) that decides to go to war and yet because of the State, French locksmiths are shooting at German farmers. Remarque noted how school masters and drill instructors were these boy soldiers real enemies yet put them in front of nameless Russian soldiers and they will shoot them.
The book hits you in the face right from the get go. A seemingly happy moment of double rations, tobacco and cigarettes is revealed to be as a result of half of the regiment being killed during the night. The fact that Baumer and his friends choose to see the extra food in their bellies as a win as opposed to fixating on their fellow soldiers deaths shows the level of suffering they have previously gone through.
Baumer goes on to explain the difficulty he and his ex classmates experience when thinking of life away from the War. Leaving home for the first time to face life in the trenches with no life experience, no job, house, wife or children to anchor them. Their link to the outside world is limited to that of their parents at a time when ties between parents and teenagers are weakest. There is very little then to connect them to the world they are fighting for or to keep them motivated in believing that life as they know it will get better.
"We were eighteen and had begun to love life and the world; then we had to shoot it to pieces."
The book is gut wrenching, from the bombings and the injuries to the simple yet devastating final paragraph. The brutalities of War are so expertly captured by Remarque that the book became one of the first books burnt by the Nazis, with Remarque accused of exaggerating the horrors to further his pacifist agenda. I'm so pleased it survived.
This month I have read three books about or including World War One, so fitting given that it's November 2018. It's not only the best of the three, it's the best war book I have ever read. Ever.
The link for the book takes you to the Global Education Trust a charity aimed at making reading accessible to all. They have a branch in the town my relatives lived, we visited and purchased all of our poppies there. Go check them out.
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