All Quiet on the Western Front

All Quiet on the Western Front (original German title: Im Westen nichts Neues, literally: "Nothing New on the Western Front") is a famous book by the German author Erich Maria Remarque. It was first published in 1929.

 Plot 
The book follows the story of Paul Baumer, a 20-year-old soldier, and his friends during a short period in World War I. The men enlisted due to the tales of honour and patriotism fed to them at home, and begins with the group having just been relieved from the front lines. Kemmerich, a friend of the boys, had suffered an injury to his thigh that resulted in amputation. As they visit him in hospital,  they realise he will die, and another soldier asks for his boots - an act that is discomforting yet undeniably pragmatic. Paul then visits Kimmerich alone, during which Kimmerich passes, and as Baumer calls for aid none is given; the nurses are preoccupied clearing the bed for the next injured.

Paul and his friends are overjoyed when their friend Katczinsky (“Kat”) returns after a search for food with two loaves of bread and a bag of raw horsemeat. Kat has always been resourceful. Paul also introduces the cruel drill sergeant Himmelstoss, a former postman with whom Paul and his friends are frequently in conflict.

The men are then called back to the front lines, falling asleep their first night to the sound of exploding shells. they awaken to hear the sounds of an impending attack, explosions in intervals and wails of injured horses to fill the silent intermissions - injuries whose gruesomeness deeply disturbs the soldiers. An attack is then launched, during which gas attacks and explosives cause carnage. Eventually, the men survive and are given time to rest as they await reinforcements.

Paul is later given 17 days' leave, during which he visits home to discover that his mother has cancer. He visits Kimmerich's mother, who questions him about her son's death, and later after an uncomfortable conversation with his own mother he wishes he never had returned, the change taking too much of a toll.

Paul next spends time at a training camp before redeployment, during which he observes how alike the russian prisoners nearby arer to his neighbours. He then returns to his regiment where there is an inspection by the Kaiser. Paul is then sent into battle at night, and becomes lost, falling in a crater wherein he stabs a french soldier that also falls. He watches as the man dies, trying to help him by giving him water and dressing the wound he inflicted. When he perishes Paul is ashamed, finding pictures of the soldier's wife and children in his breast pocket alongside letters. He waits for several hours with the corpse beside him until he regains his composure and returns safely to his trench.

Paul's friends begin to die one by one, until he eventually becomes the last of his seven classmates. the novel then shifts perspective, taking a third-person view rather than Baumer's first-person perspective, and we learn that Paul has died. The report released by the army on the day of his death only reads "All quiet on the western front."

 Response 
The book sold 2.5 million copies in 22 languages in eighteen months. It is published by Ballantine Books in 1929. This book and its sequel, The Road Back, were banned and burned in Nazi Germany. The film version won the Academy Award for Best Picture in 1930.

Category:1929 books