All Quiet on the Western Front: Analysis of Setting
"All Quiet on the Western Front" is a novel set during World War I that offers a poignant exploration of the experiences of soldiers on the Western Front, where German forces clashed with the Western Allies. The setting is characterized by extensive trench systems and the harsh realities of warfare, where soldiers faced continuous bombardment and endured appalling living conditions. The narrative emphasizes the impersonal nature of war, as individual soldiers, represented by the protagonist Paul Baumer, are viewed as expendable within outdated military strategies focused on attrition. The novel starkly contrasts the battlefront with the home front, where Paul’s brief return to his small German hometown reveals a disconnect between the experiences of soldiers and the perceptions of those untouched by the horrors of combat. This contrast underscores the profound impact of war on Paul and his generation, illustrating a dramatic shift in understanding and values. Through this setting, the novel conveys the futility and randomness of death in war, as well as the emotional and psychological toll it takes on young men like Paul. Overall, the setting serves as a critical backdrop to the themes of disillusionment, loss, and the stark realities of human conflict.
All Quiet on the Western Front: Analysis of Setting
First published:Im Westen nichts Neues serial, 1928; book, 1929 (English translation, 1929)
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Political
Time of work: World War I
Asterisk denotes entries on real places.
Places Discussed
*Western front
*Western front. Theater of World War I in which German forces faced the Western Allies along an extensive series of battlefields that ran from the Belgian coast south into northern France. (The eastern front was the line along which Germany confronted Russia.) Much of the western front was made up of intricate systems of trenches from which troops sallied forth across treacherous “no-man’s-lands” in mostly futile attacks on enemy positions. Through most of the war, the battlefronts moved very little, and many troops stationed in the trenches endured continuous bombardment and suffered from appalling health conditions as formerly peaceful farmlands and pleasant countryside were converted into bloody battlefields.
It was along the western front that the French and British armies and those of their allies aligned themselves against the armies of Germany and its allies, using such modern weapons and implements as poison gas, tanks, powerful explosives, flame throwers, hand grenades, machine guns, long-range artillery, aircraft, and barbed wire. Thanks to modern technology, the scale of death and injury was catastrophic. Individual soldiers were considered expendable in outmoded military strategies governed by policies of attrition dictating the winners would be the last side to have soldiers still standing. This was especially true on the western front, where battles continued for months while corpses and casualties mounted.
The novel neither locates its protagonist, Paul Baumer, in any specific battlefield nor focuses on the larger strategies or battles of the war. Instead, it reveals the war only as it is experienced through the limited and subjective perspective of Paul, who knows little about the larger purposes of the war. Paul represents all the nameless soldiers who fought on the western front. To him, the battles seem both meaningless and frightening; ordinary days with his comrades are interrupted by unreal but frenetic periods of battle. Ironically, it is during one uneventful day on the front that the young, poetic Paul is unexpectedly shot by desultory enemy fire shortly before the Armistice is declared and the fighting stops. The impersonality and randomness of his death brings home the entire character of war on the western front as depicted in this novel—the inconsequential value of the millions of individual soldiers who died.
Home front
Home front. While most of the narrative takes place on the battlefront lines, one section of the novel takes Paul back to his hometown in Germany, allowing readers to contrast that world with his experiences on the front lines. During his leave, Paul returns home to a typical German small town of the time that is accustomed to the comforts and securities of peaceful middle-class life. The unnamed town represents all small German towns of the time.
Remarque uses Paul’s visit to his home to indicate the vast gulf between his perspective of the war and that of those who remain on the home front. The people at home, while suffering some deprivations, have no idea of the dimensions and depth of the suffering on the battlefields of the western front. Paul’s trip back home consolidates his feelings of a generational shift in which he and his peers represent a dramatic break with the past.
Bibliography
Barker, Christine R., and R. W. Last. Erich Maria Remarque. New York: Barnes & Noble, 1979. An accessible biography, with a great deal of material that is relevant to All Quiet on the Western Front. Good, brief coverage of the novel’s popular and scholarly reception. The best place to start further study.
Firda, Richard Arthur. “All Quiet on the Western Front”: Literary Analysis and Cultural Context. New York: Twayne, 1993. Contains much biographical information, as well as a somewhat pedantic but solid discussion of the novel. Useful annotated bibliography.
Pfeiler, Wilhelm K. War and the German Mind: The Testimony of Men of Fiction Who Fought at the Front. New York: Columbia University Press, 1941. An excellent study of German World War I novels. The chapter on All Quiet on the Western Front treats the novel in the context of contemporary war novels; especially good on political background and reception.
Taylor, Harley U., Jr. Erich Maria Remarque: A Literary and Film Biography. New York: Peter Lang, 1989. Four brief chapters supply a very basic, even journalistic treatment of the novel and the fascinating story of the 1930 American film based on it. Useful chronology.
Wagener, Hans. Understanding Eric Maria Remarque. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1991. The best starting point for further general study, a basic text that treats all of Remarque’s works. In one long chapter, All Quiet on the Western Front receives a thorough analysis. A basic biographically and historically grounded presentation.