Compare and Contrast: Wwi Lit

All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque is a World War I novel of a German soldier. “Recruiting” by E. A. Mackintosh is a poem about World War I recruiting in England. These works both represent all aspects of society during the Great War. They also show the realities of war during this time period. Some differences between these two works lie within their points of view and the messages that they try to portray. All Quiet on the Western Front and “Recruiting” both share the idea of sacrifice and how it affects the soldiers. They also share the message of how war is horrific and destroys the men fighting. However, they differ in the perspective that they portray the ideas and their message.

Sacrafice

Sacrifice exists in all war, especially in the first world war. The sacrifice the soldiers of world war one had to make were astonishing. Both All Quiet on the Western Front and “Recruiting” explain how the soldiers took those sacrifices and how those sacrifices affects the soldiers. In All Quiet on the Western Front, Erich Maria Remarque (1929) wrote that “We want to live at any price; so we cannot burden ourselves with feelings which, though they might be ornamented enough in peacetime, would be out of place here.”(p. 139) He explains how the soldiers are willing to give up all their dreams and their future to survive. The men of world war one also were willing to sacrifice their lives to serve their country. E. A. Mackintosh (1918) explained that in “Recruiting”, “If you will but pay the price, Learn the gaiety and strength In the gallant sacrifice. Take your risk of life and death” (para. 10-11) Mackintosh is saying if they are going to join the armed services that they need to be willing to risk their life. They explained how sacrifice existed and how it affected the soldiers in the world. Remarque (1929) also wrote “While they (the pontificating teachers and politicos) continued to write and talk, we saw the wounded and dying. While they taught that duty to one's country is the greatest thing, we already knew that death-throes are stronger.” (p. 9) This quote show that even though all the adults were teaching that it was great to serve for the nations cause, only the young kids were making the true sacrifice with their lives. These kids are fighting and sacrificing their lives for a cause that only involves the few old adults that are not willing to fight. These works compare greatly with their representation of sacrifice from the younger generation.

Message

Both texts are similar in the fact that their messages, differ from the messages of the same genre during the time period. Most works of the early 20th century about war tended to romanticize war and speak of glory and honor, but these two are different. All Quiet on the Western Front and “Recruiting” revel a message that war is hell and that there is nothing good about war. Remarque (1929) explained this especially well when he stated that:

A man cannot realize that above such shattered bodies there are still human faces in which life goes its daily round. And this is only one hospital, one single station; there are hundreds of thousands in Germany, hundreds of thousands in France, hundreds of thousands in Russia. How senseless is everything that can ever be written, done, or thought when such things are possible. It must all be lies and of no account when the culture of a thousand years could not prevent this stream of blood being poured out, these torture-chambers in their hundreds of thousands. A hospital alone shows what war is. (p. 269)

Not only does Remarque mentions the Germans, but he also mentions the enemies the Germans are fight. He reveals to the reader that everyone is going through this same hellish warfare even though he is only visiting one hospital. This message is revealed numerous other times in the book, like when wrote, “Katczinsky is right when he says it would not be such a bad war if only one could get a little more sleep. In the line we have next to none, and fourteen days is a long time at one stretch.” He gives another representation of how the soldiers went through hell because they had little sleep for days at a time and had little energy.

The poem “Recruiting” has a similar message for the reader, the message of how horrific war is. Mackintosh (1918) writes “Take your risk of life and death Underneath the open sky. Live clean or go out quick - Lads, you're wanted. Come and die.” (para.11) The way Mackintosh wrote that paragraph, explains that the soldiers need to risk their lives, and that they have a grave chance of being killed. This relates to the message of war being unbearable because it presents the idea that all the soldiers must be prepared to die, that they are going to war to die. That idea is incomprehensible for many people, but the soldiers of World War I understood that that is what was needed. Maybe not why that was needed but knew it needed done.

Point of View

All Quiet on the Western Front and “Recruiting” are both pieces of literature about World War I, but they are from opposing sides. All Quiet on the Western Front give the reader a point of view from the German line fighting the British. In contrast, “Recruiting” give the reader the perspective of the British at war with the German military. In All Quiet on the Western Front, it is written “But on the last day an astonishing number