Wat Attitude

Throughout the modern busy life of the peaceful society nowadays, people often disregard the honor and sufferings of those that had fallen from fighting for "the freedom of the world?in the not so distant past. Each year, Canadians remember on November 11th, Armistice Day, those brave soldiers who fell in World War One. Also known as the Great War, the years between 1914 and 1918 were tremendously harsh. No battles prior to this had lasted nonstop for such a long time; and the death toll accumulated over the four years was overwhelming. At first, young men enlisted to express their patriotic passion and duty towards their own nation. They all want to become "national heroes?yet do not realize the true bloodshed and devious journey they face. Through posters and poetry, many poets and writers promote the idea of national glory through their work during the war; however, after the war, after the exploding of nationalism and political ideology, authors then turn to exploit the horrid of wars. Erich Maria Remarque and Ernest Hemingway are two authors that stand their grounds in their views of anti-war in their novels All Quiet on the Western Front and The Sun Also Rises. By creating the life led by those who fought in the war, both Hemingway and Remarque express their attitudes and articulate the horrid of warfare in these novels.

In Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, the majority of the personas of the story are World War One veterans. Jake Barnes, the protagonist and narrator of the story, is a part of the "Lost Generation? those people who became of age during and shortly after the First World War. Those participants of the Great War are left with nothing but emptiness in their life after the horror. They meander around the streets at night, having no clear objective in life, drinking away their sorrows. Their memories contain nothing more but the shouting and killing of the battlefield; and that is the reason to their pointless life, currently. The parties Jake attend to have no meaning in them. Moreover, through symbol of Jake's impotency, due to an injury from the war, the Lost Generation appears, like Jake's private part, to be useless to society. Their aims at life and achievements are all destroyed by those four years of fighting and screaming. However, it is not true to say that Jake is oblivious of the cause of this emptiness. They cannot simply cure themselves from this posttraumatic disease by simply wondering through life. Although Jake is obvious of this, he is not able to break free of his habits. For one thing, he can stand up where he fell and restart his life again; yet, he chooses not to. This is the main attitude of Hemingway's attitude towards the war. They cause such traumatic experience to people that the veterans of the war cannot simply go back to their ways of living after the war. Those of the Lost Generation are not able to cope with what they have experienced from the war and thus do not acquire the ability to change their ways of life.

Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front also emphasises on the bad results from the Great War. During the war, eager young men are very enthusiastic about joining in with the fight. Many are talked into volunteering to fight in the war. No one actually knows what they face; other than the fact that it is not only an opportunity to glorify each individual as well as show the strength of their nation. Those that are not interested in volunteering were often made outcasts and condemned from the society. The protagonist of the story is a German soldier who fights in the front line during the war; he is called Paul BÐ'umer. The story is Paul's perspective of the true trench warfare. It talks about the things that parents would not hear from the generals as they enlist their sons into battle; the real bloodshed and deaths that occur due to bad decisions of some thirty particular individuals. At first, Paul, like the rest of those in the army, enlists into the army due to his loyalty