All Quiet on the Western Front
Uploaded by Admin on Jan 22, 1999
The remains of Paul Baumer's company had moved behind the German front lines for a short rest at the beginning of the novel. After Behm became Paul's first dead schoolmate, Paul viewed the older generation bitterly, particularly Kantorek, the teacher who convinced Paul and his classmates to join the military, feeling alone and betrayed in the world that they had left for him. Paul's generation felt empty and isolated from the rest of the world due to the fact that they had never truly established any part of themselves in civilian life. At boot camp, Himmelstoss abused Paul and his friends, yet the harassment only brought them closer together and developed a strong spirit amongst them. Katczinsky, or Kat, was soon shown to be a master scavenger, being able to provide the group with food or virtually anything else; on this basis Paul and him grew quite close. Paul's unit was assigned to lay barbed wire on the front line, and a sudden shelling resulted in the severe wounding of a recruit that Paul had comforted earlier. Paul and Kat again strongly questioned the War. After Paul's company were returned to the huts behind the lines, Himmelstoss appeared and was insulted by some of the members of Paul's unit, who were then only mildly punished. During a bloody battle, 120 of the men in Paul's unit were killed. Paul was given leave and returned home only to find himself very distant from his family as a result of the war. He left in agony knowing that his youth was lost forever. Before returning to his unit, Paul spent a little while at a military camp where he viewed a Russian prisoner of war camp with severe starvation problems and again questioned the values that he had grown up with contrasted to the values while fighting the war. After Paul returned to his unit, they were sent to the front. During an attack, Paul killed a French soldier. After discovering that this soldier had a family, Paul was deeply shattered and vowed to prevent other such wars. Paul's unit was assigned to guard a supply depot of an abandoned village, but he and Kropp were soon wounded when trying to escape from the village. Paul headed back to the front, only to engage in final battles where all of his friends were killed. The death of Kat was particularly hard for...