All Quiet on the Western Front

Paul signs up for the German Army

Jul 10, 1916

Paul signs up for the arny because his teacher pushing him to do it. "I wanted to become a head-forester once."

Special Trianing

Aug 13, 1916

Paul is sent to a special training camp next to a war prisoner compound

Iron Youth

Sep 8, 1916

Another letter, Kantorek's letter to the troops, praises them as "The Iron Youth" – but the men scoff at any praise from the man they used to respect. And they laugh at being called "youth" – after all they have seen, they now feel old. "It's queer, when one thinks about it," goes on Kropp

Paul and friends come back form the front line

Sep 19, 1916

When paul and his friends come back from the front line the have lost half there men. " But on the last day an astonishing number of English field guns opened up on us with high-explosive, drumming ceaselessly on our position, so that we suffered heavily and came back only eighty strong.'

Schoolhouse

Nov 27, 1916

Paul is back on the Front, guarding a bombed schoolhouse, preparing to enter Russia "Then what exactly is the war for?" asks Tjaden.

Philosophize

Dec 30, 1916

Paul philosophizes about the separation of his early life and what he is experiencing now. He know that even those who physically survive the war cannot go back

Kantorek's letter

Feb 3, 1917

kantorek send a letter and Paul wishes he was on 'Because he could not see, and was mad with pain, he failed to keep under cover, and so was shot down before anyone could go and fetch him.'

Josef Behm

Apr 14, 1917

Josef Behm dies it was the first death Paul and his friends had seen in the war. 'My thoughts become confused. This atmosphere of carbolic and gangrene clogs the lungs, it is a thick gruel, it suffocates. '

Loaf Around

Apr 27, 1917

The men loaf around – even Himmelstoss has mellowed. The men have gained a bit of respect for him for his having helped bring in Haie Westhus after Haie was so badly injured. "Couldn't you polish him up a bit?"

HImmelstoss

May 14, 1917

When Himmelstoss forces them to do many drills, they accommodate – but slowly – in passive-aggressive resistance, which drives Himmelstoss crazy. "Revenge is black-pudding."

Kemmerich got hurt

May 17, 1917

Kemmerrich getts hurt they go see him the hosptial. 'Hospital-orderlies go to and fro with bottles and pails. One of them comes up, casts a glance at Kemmerich and goes away again. You can see he is waiting, apparently he wants the bed.'

Shell Holes

May 25, 1917

They pass shell holes described almost like scars on the earth – a stark contrast to the earth as described in motherly terms just a few pages earlier. "we are here to protect our fatherland. And the French are over there to protect their fatherland. Now who's in the right?"

Planes

Jun 11, 1917

There are planes involved as well – searchlights sweep the sky "one of them pauses, and quivers a little. Immediately a second is beside him, a black insect is caught between them and tries to escape – the airman. He hesitates, is blinded and falls"

Barbed Wire

Sep 5, 1917

The men are sent on a mission to lay barbed wire at the front slow the approach of the enemies. "He's too stupid, I couldn't be bothered," answers Mittelstaedt

Natural Fog

Mar 4, 1918

Our narrator talks about the natural fog of the area blending with the gunpowder smoke and the exhaust of the motorcar engines. "but this relates to the whole. And of that you are not able to judge. You see only your little sector and so cannot have any general survey. You do your duty, you risk your lives, that deserves the highest honour – every man of you ought to have the Iron Cross – but first of all the enemy line must be broken through in Flanders and then rolled up in the top."

Animal Instincts

Mar 14, 1918

He talks about animal instincts of fear and self-preservation guiding them amidst the shelling. "We reach the zone where the front begins and become on the instant human animals"

Back to Base

Jun 10, 1918

Paul is sent back to the base where he did his basic training with Himmelstoss and Tjaden, but he knows almost nobody there now. "Territorial Kantorek, two years ago you preached us into enlisting; and among us, there was one, Joseph Behm, who didn't want to enlist. He was killed three months before he would have been called up in the ordinary way. If it had not been for you he would have lived just that much longer. And now: Dismiss. You will hear from me later."

Rat Attention

Jun 11, 1918

The men's attention turns to rats, which are over-running the camp and the trenches. They steal food and scamper over soldiers' faces while they are sleeping. Paul says, "The Front is a cage in which we must await fearfully whatever may happen. We lie under the network of arching shells and live in suspense of uncertainty. Over us Chance hovers"

Fellow Soldiers

Oct 1, 1918

Paul knows that if he and his fellow soldiers return home now, there will be no glory, that he will be isolated and not understood. "You limp, will you get out – you hound, you skunk, sneak out of it, would you?'

Paul dies

Oct 14, 1918

Paul dies but he don't look sad he looks happy, he even had a smile on his face. "Let a man be whatever you like in peace-time, what occupation is there in which he can behave like that without getting a crack on the nose? He can only do that in the army. It goes to the heads of them all, you see. And the more insignificant a man has been in civil life the worse it takes him."