Absurdism In All Quiet On The Western Front

In the book All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque, is about a group of German schoolboys who enlist to fight in WWI. It is told by one of the characters, Paul’s, perspective. The boys don’t have anything to go back to after the war. The author is a German veteran, and talks about his experience on the front, through the book. Their teacher, who convinced them to join, said it was good fighting for your country. But as they start fighting, the boys start to realize it is nothing like they were told, or imagined. Paul goes through absurdism where he goes through an unconscious living, and as a response at the end he gives in.

Paul Baumer goes through an unconscious living near the middle of the book. First, he was looking for pleasure, because when he was with his

Also, he gives up on hope, “Let the months and years come, they can take nothing from me, they can take nothing more. I am so alone, and so without hope that I can confront them without fear. The life that has borne me through these years is still in my hands and my eyes” (p. 295). This is showing that Paul is giving in, because he has nothing else left. Everything has been taken away from him, and that there is nothing more that could be taken away. Because of him losing everything, and now also hope, he gives up, and ready to give in. Although Paul fights long and hard in the war, at the end he is glad he is going to die, “ All quiet on the Western Front. He had fallen forward and lay on the earth as though sleeping. Turning him over one saw that he could not have suffered long; his face had an expression of calm, as though almost glad the end had come” (p. 296). This happens when all his friends are dead, and he is left in the war. Until this point, he had been fighting in the war, but now he wants it to end already, and it is going to end for him. He is very calm about it, which also shows that he is giving