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effects of war on soldiers essay
mental and physical consequences of war for soldiers
impact of war on human life
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This is an essay on the short story “Soldier’s Home” by Hemingway. Will the life of a soldier ever be the same after returning from war? Many generations of young adults have gone from their homes with tranquil settings to experience war and come home to a different world. Many have witnessed the devastations and atrocities that occur with war. Harold Krebs, a young man from a small town with a loving family is no different from those before him and those to follow. The anguish of what war is however cannot dispel the thoughts and memories of what many young men come home to face in the real world. Many have trouble coping in the new world known as home.
The setting in this story is a small town in rural Oklahoma in the late hot summer. Harold Krebs is part of a loving family with a good moral up bringing and high standards. The family is middle class. Krebs, at the time of his enlistment is a student at a Methodist college in Kansas and goes off to war. Krebs, as most young men in the twenties did not volunteer for military service. He Left for Germany and his part of the war, as was the expectations of the time for all men coming of age.
Upon returning home, Krebs felt different and distant from the town folk. No welcome home given by the town. Krebs was not welcomed home, “He came back much too late” (Hemingway 185). The war was over and had been for a couple of years and the town felt he should have been home earlier. Hemingway does not give an explanation why Harold is the last to return home after the war. The others drafted with him have all returned and received a hero’s welcome back from the town. Krebs returning to his hometown parallels that of Hemingway himself: “When Hemingway returned home early...
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...who is the same age, has a job, and getting married. She is also concerned her son will not be a credit to society. Krebs only withdraws more because of his mother. The father in the story is distant and a stock character. He is there but not an influence on his son’s life and only spoken of though the mother and her comments. Krebs has a sister named Helen in the story, she likes baseball, and he is very fond of her. She is a stock character and there as support to the family environment and setting of the story.
Krebs has all the memories and thoughts of war: “When you go to war as a boy, you have a great illusion of immortality” (Putnam 20). The realization of war and its after effects and persistent memories, Krebs decides to move. He begins a new life to sort out his emotional heartaches. He realizes the only way to move forward in life is to move on.
This Newberry award nominated book, written by Irene Hunt, tells the story of the “home life” of her grandfather, Jethro, during the Civil War. Not only does it give a sense of what it is like to be in the war but also it really tells you exactly what the men leave behind. Jethro is forced to make hard decisions, and face many hardships a boy his age shouldn't have to undergo. This is an admirable historical fiction book that leaves it up to the reader to decide if being at home was the superior choice or if being a soldier in the war was.
Tina Chen’s critical essay provides information on how returning soldiers aren’t able to connect to society and the theme of alienation and displacement that O’Brien discussed in his stories. To explain, soldiers returning from war feel alienated because they cannot come to terms with what they saw and what they did in battle. Next, Chen discusses how O’Brien talks about soldiers reminiscing about home instead of focusing in the field and how, when something bad happens, it is because they weren’t focused on the field. Finally, when soldiers returned home they felt alienated from the country and
A photo of Krebs during World War I shows him with a corporal and two German girls on the Rhine River. One's first thought of this picture may be of a lighthearted sightseeing trip on leave from the front. However, in the photograph, Krebs and the other corporal are described as "too big for their uniforms," the German girls as "not beautiful," and the Rhine does not even appear in the photograph (154). This is how Ernest Hemingway begins "Soldier's Home," the story of a young war veteran named Harold Krebs who has recently returned home. Everything that Krebs says and does is to make his life as smooth and have as few complications as possible, more than likely a stark contrast to his life in Europe.
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 in 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. The relationship between Paul and Kat is only found during war, in which nothing can break them apart. The comradeship between soldiers at war is what keeps them alive, that being the only good quality to come out of war.
What does war do to a man? It destroys his inner being; it crushes hope; it kills him. Experiencing battle leaves only the flesh of a man, for he no longer has a personality; it leaves a wasteland where a vast field of humanity once was. Through the main character, Paul Baumer, the reader experiences the hardships and consequences of war. During the course of the war, Paul reflects on how the young men involved in the war have no future left for them, they've become a "lost generation." Paul feels that his generation has "become a wasteland" because the war has made him into a thoughtless animal, because he knew nothing before the war, and because the war has shown the cheapness of human life.
During this time period it was common for young men to enlist into the army for the thrill and honor. While this task is not as strenuous (in terms of literal battle) as being a on the front line of the field, the visions and experiences are definitely both life changing. While on the Italian front, Hemingway was seriously wounded by a mortar blast, following a machine gun while handing out supplies (165). Not only is the presence of war and injury presented in “Soldier’s Home,” but it is also prevalent in his other short stories that make up his collection In Our Time (165). It is evident that through the characters of his collections, that Hemingway first handedly understands the gravity of the impact that is left on people’s lives after returning from a war. This is evident in “Soldier’s Home” as he clearly depicts that not only was Krebs changed, but his mother was also distraught by her son’s mental
Hemingway, Ernest. "Soldier's Home." The Bedford Introduction to Literature, 6th Edition. Ed. Michael Meyer. New York: Bedford/St. Martin's. 2002. 152-57.
War deprives soldiers of so much that there is nothing more to take. No longer afraid, they give up inside waiting for the peace that will come with death. War not only takes adolescence, but plasters life with images of death and destruction. Seeger and Remarque demonstrate the theme of a lost generation of men in war through diction, repetition, and personification to relate to their readers that though inevitable and unpredictable, death is not something to be feared, but to calmly be accepted and perhaps anticipated. The men who fight in wars are cast out from society, due to a misunderstanding of the impact of such a dark experience in the formative years of a man’s life, thus being known as the lost generation.
In Hemingway’s short story “Soldier’s Home”, Hemingway introduces us to a young American soldier, that had just arrived home from World War I. Harold Krebs, our main character, did not receive a warm welcome after his arrival, due to coming home a few years later than most soldiers. After arriving home, it becomes clear that World War I has deeply impacted the young man, Krebs is not the same man that headed off to the war. The war had stripped the young man of his coping mechanism, female companionship, and the ability to achieve the typical American life.
The story, A Soldiers Home, is about a man in conflict with the past and present events in his life. The young man’s name is Harold Krebs. He recently returned from World War 1 to find everything almost exactly the same as when he left. He moved back into his parents house, where he found the same car sitting in the same drive way. He also found the girls looking the same, except now they all had short hair. When he returned to his home town in Oklahoma the hysteria of the soldiers coming home was all over. The other soldiers had come home years before Krebs had so everyone was over the excitement. When he first returned home he didn’t want to talk about the war at all. Then, when he suddenly felt the urge and need to talk about it no one wanted to hear about it. When he returned all of the other soldiers had found their place in the community, but Harold needed more time to find his place. In the mean time he plays pool, “practiced on his clarinet, strolled down town, read, and went to bed.”(Hemingway, 186) When his mother pressures him to get out and get a girlfriend and job, he te...
When the war breaks out, this tranquil little town seems like the last place on earth that could produce a team of vicious, violent soldiers. Soon we see Jim thrown into a completely contrasting `world', full of violence and fighting, and the strong dissimilarity between his hometown and this new war-stricken country is emphasised. The fact that the original setting is so diversely opposite to that if the war setting, the harsh reality of the horror of war is demonstrated.
One of Ernest Hemingway’s greatest novels, “A Farewell to Arms”, has been surrounded by controversy among literary, as well as historical, scholars regarding Hemingway’s inspiration for the famous novel. Many feel that Ernest Hemingway created this fictional book solely from his imagination rather than his experiences, while others believe that Hemingway drew the inspiration for this book from his experience as a volunteer ambulance driver throughout the war. Even though there has been much controversy, there is documented historical proof that the experiences that Hemingway had experienced from his time in the war had influenced his creation of “A Farewell to Arms”.
First, if there was a point made of the setting what would this story be like? Would Kreb’s be in Paris or Germany still? Would he have come home earlier if he knew it was a more bustling town? Hemmingway made the point of setting this story in a slow Oklahoma town that had no prospects of getting any better. Krebs was out of a Methodist college and went straight to the war (133). Krebs knew the lifestyle that he left behind and what would be expected of him when he returned. His family expected a return to his pre-war state of a young man out of college. The setting in Oklahoma probably did not entice Krebs any longer and he hungered for something better than settling down and becoming a working man. New York City or even Los Angeles might have created a different setting for Kreb’s. Maybe these towns might have offered a more exciting lifestyle for this young man. Hemmingway is maybe trying to portray that Kreb’s was held down by consequences of the war and this Oklahoma town would again have consequences for Kreb’s. Marriage, children, and a steady job were these the consequences Kreb’s spoke of when he mentioned courting the women in this town? Possibly, and he knew that he wasn’t going to live a lie any longer.
The short story “In Another Country” by Earnest Hemingway is a story about the negative effects of war. The story follows an unnamed American officer and his dealings with three other officers, all of whom are wounded in World War I and are recuperating in Milan, Italy. In war, much can be gained such as freedom and peace, however war also causes a plethora of negative consequences. Cultural alienation, loss of physical and emotional identity, and the irony of war technology and uncertainty of life are all serious consequences of war that are clearly shown by Hemingway.
Hemingway wrote form his past experiences form life. In Indian Camp it showed his relationship with his father. By leaving his childhood and entering the war, he was able to come up with the character Henry and Barkley in A Farwell In Arms. When returning home from the war Hemingway used Krebs in Soldier’s Home to express his distast