Erich Maria Remarque's
All Quiet on the Western Front, a novel set in World
War I, centersaround the changes wrought by the war on one young German soldier.
During his time in the war, Remarque's protagonist, Paul Baumer, changes from a
rather innocent Romantic to a hardened and somewhat caustic veteran. More
importantly, during the course of this metamorphosis, Baumer disaffiliates
himself from those societal icons-parents, elders, school, religion-that had
been the foundation of his pre-enlistment days. This rejection comes about as a
result of Baumer's realization that the pre-enlistment society simply does
not understand the reality of the Great War. His new society, then, becomes the
Company, his fellow trench soldiers, because that isa group which does
understand the truth as Baumer has experienced it.
Remarque demonstrates
Baumer's disaffiliation from the traditional by emphasizing the language of
Baumer'spre- and post-enlistment societies. Baumer either can not, or chooses
not to, communicate truthfully with those representatives of his pre-enlistment
and innocent days. Further, he is repulsed by the banal and meaningless language
that is used by members of that society. As he becomes alienated from his
former, traditional, society, Baumer simultaneously is able to communicate
effectively only with his military comrades. Since the novel is told from the
first person point of view, the reader can see how the words Baumer speaks are
at variance with his true feelings. In his preface to the novel, Remarque
maintains that "a generation of men ... were destroyed by the war"(Remarque, All
Quiet Preface). Indeed, in All Quiet on the Western Front, the meaning of
language itself is, to a great extent, destroyed.
Early in the novel, Baumer
notes how his elders had been facile with words prior to his enlistment.
Specifically, teachers and parents had used words, passionately at times, to
persuade him and other young men to enlist in the war effort. After relating the
tale of a teacher who exhorted his students to enlist, Baumer states that
"teachers always carry their feelings ready in their waistcoat pockets, and trot
them out by the hour" (Remarque, All Quiet I. 15). Baumer admits that he, and
others, were fooled by this rhetorical trickery. Parents, too, were not averse
to using words to shame their sons into enlisting. "At that time even one's
parents were ready with the word `coward'" (Remarque, All Quiet I. 15).
Remembering those days, Baumer asserts that, as a result of his war experiences,
he has learned how shallow the use of these words was.
Indeed, early in his
enlistment, Baumer comprehends that although authority figures taught that duty
to one's country is the greatest thing, we already knew that death-throes are
stronger. But for all that, we were no mutineers, no deserters, no cowards-they
were very free with these expressions. We loved our country as much as they; we
went courageously into every action; but also we distinguished the false from
true, we had suddenly learned to see. (Remarque, All Quiet I. 17)
What
Baumer and his comrades have learned is that the words and expressions used by
the pillars of society do not reflect the reality of war and of one's
participation in it. As the novel progresses, Baumer himself uses words in a
similarly false fashion.
A number of instances of Baumer's own misuse of
language occur during an important episode in the novel-a period of leave when
he visits his home town. This leave is disastrous for Baumer because he realizes
that he can not communicate with the people on the home front
because of his
military experiences and their limited, or nonexistent, understanding of the
war.
When he first enters his house, for example, Baumer is overwhelmed at
being home. His joy and relief are such that he cannot speak; he can only weep
(Remarque, All Quiet VII. 140). When he and his mother greet each other, he
realizes immediately that he has nothing to say to her: "We say very little and
I am thankful that sheasks nothing" (Remarque, All Quiet VII. 141). But finally
she does speak to him and asks, "'Was it very bad out there, Paul?'" (Remarque,
All Quiet VII. 143).
Here, when he answers, he lies, ostensibly to protect
her from
hearing of the chaotic conditions from which he has just returned.
He
thinks to himself,
“Mother, what should I answer to that! You would
not
understand, you could never realize it. And you never shall
realize
it. Was it bad, you ask.-You, Mother,--I shake my
head and say: "No, Mother,
not so very. There are always a
lot of us together so it isn't so bad."
(Remarque, All Quiet VII. 143)
Even in trying to protect her, by using words
that are false, Baumer creates a separation between his mother andhimself.
Clearly, as Baumer sees it, such knowledge is not for the uninitiated. On
another level, however, Baumer cannot respond to his mother's question: he
understands that the experiences he has had are so overwhelming that a
"civilian" language, or any language at all, would be ineffective in describing
them. Trying to replicate theexperience and horrors of the war via words is
impossible, Baumer realizes, and so he lies. Any attempt at telling the truth
would, in fact, trivialize its reality.
During the course of his leave,
Baumer also sees his father. The fact that he does not wish to speak with his
parent (i.e., use few or no words at all) shows Baumer's movement away from the
traditional institution of the family. Baumer reports that his father "is
curious [about the war] in a way that I find stupid and distressing; I nolonger
have any real contact with him" (Remarque, All Quiet VII. 146). In considering
the demands of his father to discuss the war, Baumer, once again, realizes the
impossibility, and, in this case, even the danger, of trying to relate the
reality of the war via language.
There is nothing he likes more than
just hearing about it. I
realize he does not know that a man cannot talk of
such things; I
would do it willingly, but it is too dangerous for me to put
these things into words. I am afraid they might then become
gigantic and
I be no longer able to master them.
(Remarque, All Quiet VII. 146)
Again, Baumer notes the impossibility of making the experience of war
meaningful within a verbal context: the war is too big, the words describing it
would have to be correspondingly immense and, with their symbolic size, might
become uncontrollable and, hence, meaningless.
While with his father, Baumer
meets other men who are certain that they know how to fight and win the war.
Ultimately, Baumer says of his father and of these men that "they talk too much
for me ... They understand of course, they agree, they may even feel it so too,
but only with words, only with words" (Remarque, All Quiet VII. 149). Baumer is
driven away from the older men because he understands that the words of his
father's generation are meaningless in that they do not reflect the realities of
the world and of the war as Baumer has come to understand them.
Also during
his leave, Baumer visits the mother of a fallen comrade, Kemmerich. As he did
with his own mother, he lies, this time in an attempt to shield her from the
details of her son's lingering death. Moreover, in this conversation, we see
Baumer rejecting yet another one of the traditional society's foundations:
religiousorthodoxy. He assures Kemmerich's mother that her son "'died
immediately. He felt absolutely nothing at all. His face was quite calm'"
(Remarque, All Quiet VII. 160). Frau Kemmerich doesn't believe him, or, at
least, chooses not to. She asks him to swear "by everything that is sacred to"
him (that is, to God, as far as she isconcerned) that what he says is true
(Remarque, All Quiet VII. 160). He does so easily because he realizes that
nothing is sacred to him. By perverting this oath, Baumer shows both his
unwillingness to communicate honestly with a member of the home front and his
rejection of the God of that society. Thus, another break with an aspect of
hispre-enlistment society is effected through Baumer's conscious misuse of
language.
During his leave, perhaps Baumer's most striking realization of
the vacuity of words in his former society occurs when he is alone in his old
room in his parents' house. After being unsuccessful in feeling a part of his
old society by speaking with his mother and his father and his father's friends,
Baumer attempts to reaffiliate with his past by once again becoming a resident
of the place. Here, among his mementos, the pictures and postcards on the wall,
the familiar and
comfortable brown leather sofa, Baumer waits for something
that will allow him to feel a part of his pre-enlistment world. It is his old
schoolbooks that symbolize that older, more contemplative, lessmilitary world
and which Baumer hopes will bring him back to his younger innocent ways.
I want that quiet rapture again. I want to feel the same
powerful,
nameless urge that I used to feel when I turned to my
books. The breath of
desire that then arose from the colored
backs of the books, shall fill me
again, melt the heavy, dead
lump of lead that lies somewhere in me and waken
again the
impatience of the future, the quick joy in the world of thought,
it shall bring back again the lost eagerness of my youth. I sit
and
wait.
(Remarque, All Quiet VII. 151)
But Baumer continues to
wait and the sign does not come; the quiet rapture does not occur. The room
itself, and the pre-enlistment world it represents, become alien to him. "A
sudden feeling of foreignness suddenly rises in me. I cannot find my way back"
(Remarque, All Quiet VII. 152). Baumer understands that he is irredeemably lost
to the primitive, military, non-academic world of the war. Ultimately, the books
are worthless because the wordsin them are meaningless. "Words, Words,
Words-they do not reach me. Slowly I place the books back in the shelves.
Nevermore" (Remarque, All Quiet VII. 153). In his experiences with traditional
society, Baumer perverts language, that which separates the human from the
beast, to the point where it has no meaning. Baumer shows his rejection of that
traditional society by refusing to, or being unable to, use the standards of its
language.
Contrasted with Baumer's experiences during his visit home are his
dealings with his fellow trench soldiers. Unlike Baumer's feelings at home where
he chooses not to speak with his father and makes an empty vow to Frau
Kemmerich, Baumer is able to effect true communication, of both a verbal and
spiritual kind, with his fellowtrench soldiers. Indeed, within this group, words
can have a meaningful, soothing, even rejuvenating, effect.
Not long after
his return from leave, Baumer and some of his comrades go out on patrol to
ascertain the enemy's strength. During this patrol, Baumer is pinned down in a
shell hole, becomes disoriented, and suffers a panic attack. He states:
"Tormented, terrified, in my imagination, I see the grey, implacable muzzle of a
rifle which moves noiselessly before me whichever way I try to turn my head"
(Remarque, All Quiet IX. 184-85). He is unable to regain his equanimity until he
hears voices behind him. He recognizes the voices and realizes that he is close
to his comrades in his own trench. The effect of his fellow soldiers' words on
Baumer is antithetical tothe effect his father's and his father's friends' empty
words have on him.
At once a new warmth flows through me. These voices,
these quiet
words ... behind me recall me at a bound from the terrible
loneliness and fear of death by which I had been almost
destroyed. They
are more to me than life these voices, they are
more than motherliness and
more than fear; they are the
strongest, most comforting thing there is
anywhere: they are the
voices of my comrades.
I am no longer ...
alone in the darkness;--
I belong to them and they to me; we all share
the same fear and
the same life, we are nearer than lovers, in a simpler, a
harder
way; I could bury my face in them, in these voices, these words
that have saved me and will stand by me.
(Remarque, All Quiet IX.
186)
Here, Baumer understands the reviving effects of his comrades'
words. Strikingly, as opposed to his town's citizens' empty words, the words of
Baumer's comrades actually go beyond their literal meanings. That is, whereas
Baumer notices that the words of the traditional world have no meaning, the
words of his comrades have more meaning than even they are aware of.
In
fact, true communication can exist in the world of the war
with few or no
words said at all. This phenomenon is perhaps best
demonstrated in the novel
during a scene involving Baumer and his
Second Company mate, Stanislaus
Katczinsky. This scene, with its
Eucharistic overtones, can be counterpoised
to Baumer's meeting
with Kemmerich's mother. During that meeting, Frau
Kemmerich insisted
on some kind of verbal attestation of Baumer's spiritual
disposition.
As noted above, he is quite willing to give her such an
asseveration
because the words he uses in doing so mean nothing to him. With
Katczinsky, though, the situation is different because the
spirituality
of the event is such that words are not necessary, in
fact, would be
hindrances to the communion Baumer and Katczinsky
attain.
The scene
is a simple one. After Baumer and Katczinsky have stolen a
goose, in a small
deserted lean-to they eat it together.
We sit opposite one another, Kat
and I, two soldiers in shabby
coats, cooking a goose in the middle of the
night. We don't talk
much, but I believe we have a more complete communion
with one
another than even lovers have ... The grease drips from our
hands, in our hearts we are close to one another ... we sit with
a goose
between us and feel in unison, are so intimate that we do
not even speak.
(Remarque, All Quiet V. 87)
These elemental and primitive
activities of getting and then
eating food bring about a communion, a
feeling "in unison," between
the two men that clearly cannot be found in the
word-heavy environment
of Baumer's home town. Perhaps Remarque wants to make
the point that
true communication can occur only in action, or in silence,
or almost
accidentally. At any rate, Baumer demonstrates toward the end of
his
life that even he is not immune from verbal duplicity of a kind that
was used on him to get him to enlist. Soon after he hears the
comforting
words of his comrades (see above), Baumer is caught in
another shell hole
during the bombardment. Here, he is forced to kill
a Frenchman who jumps
into it while attacking the German lines. Baumer
is horrified at his action.
He notes, "This is the first time I have
killed with my hands, whom I can
see close at hand, whose death is my
doing" (Remarque, All Quiet IX. 193).
That is, the war, and his part
in it, have become much more personalized
because now he can actually
see the face of his enemy. In his grief, Baumer
takes the dead man's
pocket-book from him so that he can find out the
deceased's name and
family situation. Realizing that the man he killed is no
monster,
that, in fact, he had a family, and is evidently very much
like
himself, Baumer begins to make promises to the corpse. He
indicates that he
will write to his family and goes so far as to
promise the corpse that he,
Baumer, will take his place on earth: "'I
have killed the printer, Gerard
Duval. I must be a printer'"
(Remarque, All Quiet IX. 197). More
importantly, Baumer renounces his
status as soldier by apologizing to the
corpse for killing him.
"Comrade, I did not want to kill you ... You
were only an idea to
me before, an abstraction that lived in my mind and
called forth
its appropriate response. It was that abstraction I stabbed ...
Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late. Why do they never
tell
us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are
just as anxious
as ours, and that we have the same fear of death,
and the same dying and the
same agony-Forgive me, comrade; how
could you be my enemy? If we threw away
these rifles and this
uniform you could be my brother just like Kat ..."
(Remarque, All Quiet IX. 195)
In addition to the obvious
brotherhood of nations sentiment that
appears in Baumer's eulogy, it is
interesting to note that Baumer sees
that Duval could have been even
closer-like Katczinsky, a member of
Baumer's inner circle of Second Company.
All of the sentiments, all of the words, that Baumer articulates
to
Duval are admirable, but they are absolutely false. As time passes,
as he
spends more time with the corpse of Duval in the shell-hole,
Baumer realizes
that he will not fulfill the various promises he has
made. He cannot write
to Duval's family; it would be beyond
impropriety to do so. Moreover, Baumer
renounces his brotherhood
sentiments: "Today you, tomorrow me" (Remarque,
All Quiet IX. 197).
Soon, Baumer admits, "I think no more of the dead man,
he is of no
consequence to me now" (Remarque, All Quiet IX. 198). And later,
to
hedge his bets in case there happens to be justice in the universe,
Baumer states, "Now merely to avert any ill-luck, I babble
mechanically:
`I will fulfill everything, fulfill everything I have
promised you-` but
already I know that I shall not do so" (Remarque,
All Quiet IX. 198).
Remarque's point in this episode is clear: no one is exempt from
the
perversion of language vis-a-vis the war. Even Paul Baumer, who
had been
disgusted by the meaninglessness of language as demonstrated
in his home
town, himself uses words and language that are
meaningless. Once he is
reunited with his comrades after the shell
hole episode, Baumer admits "it
was mere drivelling nonsense that I
talked out there in the shell-hole"
(Remarque, All Quiet IX. 199). Why
does Baumer do it? Why does he employ the
same types of vacuous words
and sentiments that his elders and teachers had
used and for which he
has no respect? "It was only because I had to lie [One
assumes that
this double meaning is apparent only in English.] there with
him so
long ... After all, war is war" (Remarque, All Quiet IX. 200).
Ultimately, that is all that and the reader are left
with: war is
war. It cannot be defined; it cannot even be discussed
with any accuracy. It
has no sense and, in fact, is the embodiment of
a lack of any kind of
meaning. In All Quiet on the Western Front,
Erich Maria Remarque shows the
disorder created by the war. This
disorder affects such elemental societal
institutions as the family,
the schools, and the church. Moreover, the war
is so chaotic that it
infects the basic abilities, not the least of which is
verbal, of
humanity itself. By showing how the First World War deleteriously
affects the syntax of language, Remarque is able to demonstrate how
the
war irreparably alters the order of the world itself.
---
WORK CITED
Remarque, Erich Maria. All Quiet on the Western Front.
New York:
Ballantine Books, 1984.
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