All Quiet on the Western Front

All Quiet on the Western Front could definitely be considered an anti-war novel. The changes the characters in the novel subjected themselves to throughout the book allow the reader to view the negative effects soldiers went through during, as well as after the war. Anti-war means that you are against the war and leaning more towards the idea of peace. This novel showed the dissatisfaction and disappointment in each character once they begun to truly understand war and battle from first-hand experience. All Quiet on the Western Front had an anti-war theme in every aspect of the book starting with the eagerness of the characters at the beginning of the war and their transformation to
193-194). All Quiet on the Western Front raises the question of what gave officials the right? If their reason for fighting was so worthy of the brutalities of war then why could it be so easily changed by a simple word of command? Why should soldiers sacrifice all for reasons that might change tomorrow? Is the motive of war really so important that it was worth all the young lives that were lost in it? Who is really right? And who is really wrong? The author brought up these questions in scenes like Duval’s death in order for the reader to see the harshness of war, the little control actual soldiers had, and to lean us more towards ideas of peace and solving problems in a more civil manner. The answer to most of these questions are viewed in a negative light towards war and therefore enable the reader to believe that this novel was certainly an anti-war one.
Another part in the novel that humanized the enemy and allowed the characters to understand they were all the same despite their nationality, and that they could all relate to one another was when Paul was guarding the Russian prisoners. “Any non-commissioned officer is more of an enemy to a recruit, any school master to a pupil, then they are to us. And yet we would shoot at them and them at us if they were free” (p. 194). Paul concluded that at any moment places could be traded and he could become a prisoner begging for food while the Russians watched over him instead. Paul