All Quiet on the Western Front and Gallipoli

587 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Impact of propaganda in the First World War

All Quiet on the Western FrontGallipoli

The Only Difference Is The Uniform

All Quiet On The Western Front and Gallipoli are two stories independent of each other that chronicle the experiences of two separate young men in the same war. Paul Baumer, a nineteen-year old German soldier, narrates the story of All Quiet On The Western Front. This tragic story begins with Baumer in training camp and concludes with his untimely death. Archy, an eighteen-year old Australian athlete, is the main character in Gallipoli. Gallipoli, a peninsula in Turkey, becomes the background for another account of a young life wasted. Although these two young men are from opposing forces of the war and lived on opposite sides of the equator, they are alike in every way else.

Paul Baumer and Archy are two idealistic young men in search of the appropriate choice to make as citizens of their respective countries. Paul Baumer has been on the receiving end of numerous years of preaching on patriotism, allegiance and nationalistic ideals. Similarly, Archy feels an almost instinctual obligation to fight for his country. Both of these characters do possess a solid understanding of what loyalty to one’s country means. Unfortunately, neither of the two is aware of exactly why their countries are at war. If they did realize the true motivation of their countries in the war, they might also realize that these goals do not correspond with their own.

Adding to the similarities of the two characters, the role of loved ones plays a major part in each story. Both Paul and Archy have someone back home who cares for him deeply, but reluctantly allows him to participate in the war. Paul Baumer’s mother is greatly saddened with the idea of her son at war. She loves Paul very deeply and fears for the worst to happen. Archy’s Uncle Jack has trained Archy to be a great athlete and had great hope in the potential of this young runner. Although, Uncle Jack can’t help but watch as Archy makes a choice which ultimately ends his life. Baumer’s mother and Uncle Jack have a unique role in Paul and Archy’s story because they are the only other characters who truly connect life before and after joining the army. Since they do not participate in the war, Baumer’s mother and Uncle Jack do not change like Paul and Archy’s friends.

Show More
Related

  • All Quiet On The Western Front Chapter 7 Summary

    415 Words  | 1 Pages

    At the beginning of chapter seven, the Second Company is taken further back to a depot for reinforcements, and the men rest. Himmelstoss wants to get on good terms with the boys and shows them kindness. Paul starts to respect him after seeing how he carried Haie Westhus when he was hit in the back. Tjaden is won over too after he learns that Himmelstoss will provide extra rations from his job as sergeant cook.

    Read More

  • All Quiet On The Western Front 'And In Flanders Field'

    720 Words  | 2 Pages

    The novel All Quiet On the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque, the poem, “In Flanders Field,” by John McCrae and the film, Gallipoli, Demonstrates how war makes men feel unimportant and, forces soldiers to make hard decisions that no one should half to make. In war people were forced to fight for their lives. Men were forced to kill one another to get their opinion across to the opposing sides. When men went home to their families they were too scared to say what had happened to them in the war. Many people had a glorified thought about how war is, Soldiers didn't tell them what had truly happened to them.

    Read More

  • All Quiet on the Western Front

    1386 Words  | 3 Pages

    Imagine being in an ongoing battle where friends and others are dying.  All that is heard are bullets being shot, it smells like gas is near, and hearts race as the times goes by.  This is similar to what war is like.  In the novel All Quiet on the Western Front, the narrator, Paul Baumer, and his friends encounter the ideals of suffering, death, pain, and despair.  There is a huge change in these men; at the beginning of the novel they are enthusiastic about going into the war.  After they see what war is really like, they do not feel the same way about it.  During the war the men experience many feelings especially the loss of loved ones.  These feelings are shown through their first experience at training camp, during the actual battles, and in the hospital.

    Read More

  • All Quiet On The Western Front: Themes

    1012 Words  | 3 Pages

    use nature as the judge to condemn war, along with shocking imagery, so that his

    Read More

  • All Quiet on the Western Front: Taking Leaves

    428 Words  | 1 Pages

    Paul Bäumer's leave from the war is an opportunity for him to see life removed from the harshness of war. As he makes the journey home, the closer he gets the more uncomfortable he feels. He describes the final part of his journey, "then at last the landscape becomes disturbing, mysterious, and familiar." (154) Rather than being filled with comfort at the familiarity of his homeland, he is uneasy. War has changed him to the extent in which he can no longer call the place where he grew up home. Bäumer visits with his mother and recognizes that ideally this is exactly what he wanted. "Everything I could have wished for has happened. I have come out of it safely and sit here beside her." (159) But ultimately he will decide that he should have never gone on leave because it is just too hard to be around his family and see how different he has become. Bäumer finds that it is easier to remain out on the war front than return to his family.

    Read More

  • The Comradeship of War in All Quiet on the Western Front

    452 Words  | 1 Pages

    The Comradeship of War in All Quiet on the Western Front War can destroy a young man, mentally and physically. One might say that nothing good comes out of war, but in Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front, there is one positive characteristic: comradeship. Paul and his friends give Himmelstoss a beating, which he deserves due to his training tactics. This starts the brotherhood of this tiny group. As explosions and gunfire sound off, a young recruit in his first battle is gun-shy and seeks reassurance in Paul's chest and arms, and Paul gently tells him that he will get used to it.

    Read More

  • All Quiet On The Western Front

    1018 Words  | 3 Pages

    Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front is a novel that takes you through the life of a soldier in World War I. Remarque is accurately able to portray the episodes soldiers go through. All Quiet on the Western Front shows the change in attitudes of the men before and during the war. This novel is able to show the great change war has evolved to be. From lining your men up and charging in the eighteenth century, to digging and “living” in the trenches with rapid-fire machine guns, bombs, and flame-throwers being exposed in your trench a short five meters away. Remarque makes one actually feel the fun and then the tragedy of warfare. At the beginning of the novel Remarque gives you nationalist feelings through pride of Paul and the rest of the boys. However at the end of the war Remarque shows how pointless war really is. This is felt when everyone starts to die as the war progresses.

    Read More

  • All Quiet On The Western Front

    611 Words  | 2 Pages

    After their first two days of fighting, they return to their bunker, where they find neither safety nor comfort. A grizzled veteran, Kat, suggests these ‘fresh-faced boys’ should return to the classroom. The war steals their spiritual belief in the sanctity of human life with every man that they kill. This is best illustrated by Paul’s journey from anguish to rationalization of the killing of Gerard Duval; the printer turned enemy who leaps into the shell-hole already occupied by Paul. Paul struggles with the concept of killing a “brother”, not the enemy. He weeps despondently as war destroys his emotional being.

    Read More

  • All Quiet On The Western Front

    1034 Words  | 3 Pages

    The story of several schoolmates who symbolize a generation destroyed by the dehumanisation of the First World War, All Quiet on the Western Front tells of the men who died, and the tragically changed lives of those who survived. Remarque follows the story of Paul Bäumer, a young infantryman, from his last days of school to his death three years later. Whereas the journey motif is typically used to portray a positive character development, that of Paul is deliberately the opposite. In what has been dubbed the greatest antiwar novel of all time, Remarque depicts the way in which Paul is snatched away from humanity by the brutality of war. However while Paul and his comrades become separated from society, and begin to rely on their basic survival instincts, in their own surroundings they still show humane qualities such as compassion, camaraderie, support and remorse. Paul’s transformation from human to soldier begins in training camp, and is reinforced by the trauma at the front. His return home further alienates him from society, and Paul begins to feel safe at the front with his friends. Nonetheless throughout the novel suffering and mortality bare Paul’s true side, and he momentarily regains his former self. Bäumer, the German word for tree, is an early indication that Paul must remain firmly rooted in reality to survive the brutality of war.

    Read More

  • All Quiet on the Western Front and the Horrors of War

    728 Words  | 2 Pages

    Throughout their lives, people must deal with the horrific and violent side of humanity. The side of humanity is shown through the act of war.  This is shown in Erich Remarque’s novel, “All Quiet on the Western Front”.  War is by far the most horrible thing that the human race has to go through.  The participants in the war suffer irreversible damage by the atrocities they witness and the things they go through.

    Read More

  • Loss of Innocence in All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque

    2805 Words  | 6 Pages

    All Quiet on the Western Front follows the story of a young soldier named Paul who was enlisted at a young age to fight for his country. Remarque, being a German veteran from the Great War was compelled to write this novel to show the reality of war unlike other authors who write a story about war witho...

    Read More

  • All Quiet on the Western Front

    671 Words  | 2 Pages

    After entering the war in young adulthood, the soldiers lost their innocence. Paul’s generation is called the Lost Generation because they have lost their childhood while in the war. When Paul visits home on leave he realizes that he will never be the same person who enlisted in the army. His pre-war life contains a boy who is now dead to him. While home on leave Paul says “I used to live in this room before I was a soldier” (170).

    Read More

  • All Quiet on the Western Front - A Book Review

    1912 Words  | 4 Pages

    Though the book is a novel, it gives the reader insights into the realities of war. In this genre, the author is free to develop the characters in a way that brings the reader into the life of Paul Baumer and his comrades. The novel frees the author from recounting only cold, sterile facts. This approach allows the reader to experience what might have been irrelevant facts if presented in a textbook. This book is written from a perspective foreign to most Americans.

    Read More

  • A Literary Analysis Of 'My Brother Sam Is Dead'

    786 Words  | 2 Pages

    War can be a very stressful thing. Not only for the people fighting, but for those close to and around them. One way the authors of My Brother Sam is Dead argue and show that they disagree with the war is that it divides and separates families. Another way they show it is that the sides are divided by principles and reality. The last way they show that they disagree is that the war is a clash of generations. There are many perspectives of war, like how they should be fought, or if people think it’s the way to solve things, but many argue against and disagree with war for many reasons.

    Read More

  • All Quiet on the Western Front: Destroying a Generation of Men

    1157 Words  | 3 Pages

    The older generation had an artificial illusion of what war is and although Paul's generation, the soldiers, loved their country, they were forced to distinguish reality from illusion. Because of this disti...

    Read More

More about All Quiet on the Western Front and Gallipoli

Open Document