All Quiet on the Western Front

Remarque, Erich Maria. All Quiet on the Western Front. 1987, first published 1928. 296p. ISBN 9780449213940.

When the First World War erupted in August 1914, soldiers on both sides rushed to the front to deal a devastating blow against their enemies in the name of the motherland. This quickly turned into a quagmire, before evolving in trench warfare where thousands of soldiers would be mowed down by machine guns as they crossed what became known as the no man's land.

Those at home did not know of the murderous nature of this conflict, thanks to effective censorship of letters and newspapers. With no means of discovering what was really taking place, people behind the lines celebrated their soldiers and enthusiastically joined the army. Paul and his friends are encouraged to join the German army by the principal of their school, who extolls the virtues of patriotism and manly honor. After limited training, their new regiment is thrown on the front line, and Paul immediately discovers that what he's been told diverges from reality. The horrors of living and fighting in a trench are too much, and Paul wonders how he will survive.

Yet he does. Assault after assault, bombardment after bombardment, Paul witnesses his friends being killed off one at a time, until he's the last one left of his group. Through visits home during furloughs, where no one understands the reality of what he faces every day, and through the all too short respites between attacks, Paul lives one day to the next, witnessing horrors no one should ever see. But then, in November 1918, it becomes all quiet on the Western Front as the war ends in Germany agreeing to an armistice. For the first time in four years, Paul cannot hear the cannons, and he feels at peace, having survived the greatest conflict the world had known up to that point.

The violence and stupidity of men as they strike at people they don't know for the idea of a State or Country is pervasive throughout, creating a surreal atmosphere where Paul doesn't even know why he is fighting. Fans of World War I and of war stories will feel they are in the trenches as Paul describes his daily activities and his survival of one shattering event after the other.