Paul In All Quiet On The Western Front

In All Quiet on the Western Front, Paul is morphed from an innocent child into a war veteran who has a new look on society. Paul used to have a carefree life where he was able to be a kid, but when he enlisted into the army it all changed. Paul became a person whose beliefs were changed because of the war. Paul doesn't believe in society anymore especially parents, elders, and school, which used to play a big part in his life. He changed his beliefs because society does not really understand how bad war really is and pushed many young men, who were not ready, into the army. Paul connects with his fellow soldiers because they are going through the same situation and

"A wounded soldier? I shout to him-no answer- must be dead." The dead body has fallen out the coffin and the coffin has been unearthed because of the shelling. Even the dead and buried cannot rest in peace during this war. This just adds to the horror of the situation Paul is in.

He states that when he goes home, his family will be shocked to hear this language. Paul treats his lingual freedom as privilege that soldiers have, and shows the benefits of living a soldier’s life. He refers to the front as if it were a paradise, for he can use vulgar language and not worry about manners and decorum. He treats his service as a time for relaxation, recreation, and a little excitement. This attitude becomes short-lived as the realities of war sink in. When Paul volunteers for reconnaissance one night, he becomes stranded in No Man’s Land (the area between opposing trenches) and begins to realize the brutality of war and starts to lose his own humanity. At the beginning of the book, Paul shows care towards his fellow soldiers and treats his service as an adventure by his education of the recruits and his excitement towards the boundaries of his vocabulary.

Paul’s books symbolize the shadow of war through the horrid violence limiting his connections to humanity. Paul’s book illustrate how the impacts by war stole his innocence and removed all his feelings to life when he tries to reconnect to the books to give sentimental meaning and revival. For instance, Paul enters his room filled with books of his childhood where he lived before the war. He turns to his books for rebirth to to once again “ feel the same

The book All Quiet on the Western Front is narrated in first person by the character named Paul Baumer, who shares his experiences on the battlefield during the final two years of the war. Paul is a German soldier who tells the story as he lives it, in the trenches, and on the frontline. Paul is a compassionate, intelligent and sensitive young man who loves his family more than anything and enjoys reading and writing poetry on his free time. Throughout the book, these character traits of Paul vanish because of the horror of the war and the anxiety it brings to him. Paul learns that death is normal and he becomes unable to grieve over the loss of his friends in the war. Paul becomes bitter and depressed throughout the war as he is unable to remember how it feels to be happy and safe.

The French soldier dies an agonizingly painful and prolonged death; his gurgling and whimpering haunting Paul, but when the soldier finally dies, the resulting silence is even more haunting and debilitating. “Paul describes the trenches, the shelling, the screams of wounded horses and men, the poison gas attack, and the rain that drenches everything. [He] describes the tension and the horror of a major battle, with the confusion, the noise, and death turning the soldiers into numbed, unthinking machines.” (All). Paul recognizes how war forces people to think and act in ways that differ from their values and beliefs, as they are desperate to survive. Remarque uses imagery and sensory details to skillfully formulate a raw and grisly atmosphere that leaves no aspect hidden. Towards the end of the novel, many of Paul’s comrades have died, and he is the only person left in his class who is alive. He expresses the desolation and misery he feels, “I am very quiet. Let the months and years come, they can take nothing from me, they can take nothing more. I am so alone, and so without hope that I can confront them without fear.” (Remarque 295). Paul has nothing left to lose at this point, so he faces his enemies free of fear and obligation to return back to his friends and his home. His sorrowful tone conveys his indifference towards death and his desire

In All Quiet on the Western Front Paul witness all the horrors of war. He sees death crawling towards the wounded soldiers in the wood, hospital, and on the front. When a soldier was wounded it killed them, they lost a limb or they got sent back to the front. Another awful part of war is soldiers would get shot and stranded out in the woods. They would yell for help, but were never found. Mental wounds were another injury of war. Paul would see people go insane on the front and some soldiers got shellshock. The worst part of the war for Paul was watching all of his comrades die, and his connection with the ones he loved at home fade away. The horrors of war is clearly represented in both Battle Scars and All Quiet on the Western Front with physical wounds, mental wounds, and loss of loved ones.

In chapter 5 of All Quiet on the Western Front written by Erich Maria Remarque, the war ruined the futures of the soldiers: “We had to fly from ourselves. From our life. We...had begun to love life; and we had to shoot it to pieces” (87-88). Paul knows that their lives were just starting, they could have done anything. This dream was extinguished when they became involved with the war. Everyone had told them this was courageous and would complete their lives with the fulfillment of serving their country. Only, all it had done was destroy their futures.

While on leave, Paul also visits his father and some of his father's friends, but does not wish to speak to them about the war. The men are "curious [about the war] in a way that [Paul finds] stupid and distressing." They try to imagine what war is like but they have never experienced it for themselves, so they cannot see the reality of it. When Paul tries to state his opinion, the men argue that "[he] sees only [his] general sector so [he is] not able to judge." These men believe they know more about the war and this makes Paul feel lost. He realizes that "they are different men here, men [he] can not understand..." and Paul wants to be back with those he can relate to, his fellow soldiers. Paul wishes he had never gone on leave because out there "[he] was a soldier, but [at home] he is nothing but an agony to himself." When Paul returns to the battlefield, he is excited to be with his comrades. When he sees his company, "[Paul] jumps up, pushes in amongst them, [his] eyes searching," until he finds his friends. It is then

Similar to the convergence of physical issues, the soldiers had a similar emotional trauma experienced. The mass death that was a consequence of the physical carnage of the war could easily lead to emotional distress due to the nature of death. Consider in All Quiet on the Western Front when the soldiers had to seek protection in a graveyard when “heavy fire” overtook them, what Paul thought about the event described the messed up mental side of the soldiers regarding death (Remarque 65). Primarily, when trying to escape the bombs and gas, and Paul had to hide in a coffin, he realized that the coffin “shall protect [Paul], thought death himself lies in it,” (Remarque 67). This whole statement can be analyzed as Paul coming to the understanding that the only way to

Yet another example of the brutalization and dehumanization of the soldiers caused by the war occurs during Paul’s leave. On leave, Paul decides to visit his hometown. While there, he finds it difficult to discuss the war and his experiences with anyone. Furthermore, Paul struggles to fit in at home: “I breathe deeply and say over to myself:– ‘You are at home, you are at home.’ But a sense of strangeness will not leave me; 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

Tim O’Brien expresses the theme ‘Fear can be expressed in many different ways’ in his story by having his characters Paul Berlin, and Buffalo (Toby), explain how Billy Watkins died. This allowed us to know the reaction of main character Private Paul Berlin who was amused by the situation simply because he was afraid of the same fate. O’Brien used Paul Berlin, irony, and setting to give a feeling of resemblances in the story, along with opposites. Paul Berlin was played to be the main character of Tim O’Brien’s “Where Have You Gone Charming Billy?,” giving you an idea of what he was feeling throughout the entire writing. He was new to war, it was obvious he was nervous and afraid, and that’s what lead to the theme.

Many of Paul's fellow army men do not survive. After the loss of Paul's closest friends,

While the disconnection allows the soldier to adapt to the brutal war environment, it inhibits them from re-entering society. When he takes his leave, he is unable to feel comfortable at home. Even if Paul had survived the war physically, he most likely would not have integrated back into society suitably. The emotional disconnection inhibits soldiers from mourning their fallen friends and comrades. However, Paul was somewhat less than able to completely detach himself from his feelings, and there are several moments in the when he feels himself pulled down by emotion. These rush of feelings indicate the magnitude to which war has automated Paul to cut himself off from feeling, as when he says, with unbridled understatement, “Parting from my friend Albert Kropp was very hard. But a man gets used to that sort of thing in the army (p. 269) .”

When someone thinks of war, it is usually the uniform, the pride, that comes to mind. The aftermath of war, to those who do not know much about it, will come as a surprise. In the movie, All Quiet on the Western Front, the character, Paul Baumer, enters the war as an innocent person; with no idea on the effects, it may have on him. In the beginning of the movie Paul is shown as an innocent eighteen-year-old teenage boy who likes to draw and read. It is when he enters military training that his innocence starts to wither away. During military training, Paul no longer does what he likes to do, and only spends his time training on how to become a good German soldier. During training, Paul is tortured by his training officer, Corporal Himmelstoss.