ipl-logo

All Quiet On The Western Front Boots Symbolism

658 Words3 Pages

The Boots of Glory and Terror In Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front, the boots of Franz Kemmerich, a solider that fought along side many young and ambitious men, serve as a quite unifying symbol throughout the novel. After the death of Kemmerich, Muller is the first, (among many), to receive the “heir loom” of Kemmerich boots. Kemmerich's high, sinuous; every soldier inherits boots as each owner dies in sequence. In retrospect, however, the boots represent and symbolize an innate and more noteworthy subject. Boots, a simple article of everyday accouterments for the soldiers turns out to be the epitome of the cheapness of human existence in the war, casualty, and then the revival of life through the boots. Kemmerich’s boots embody the parsimony of mortal subsistence in war. Kemmerich’s life is at wits-end, and Muller knows that he is next in line for the boots. “Muller returns to the subject of the boots. They would fit me perfectly.” (Pg. 9) Muller is more apprehensive about a material object rather than a soul of a fellow comrade that will soon take his last breath. Decent pair of boots is more …show more content…

After the death of one of their own, the boots are given to a solider that has a chance, that is breathing, that has life. The boots are revived with a sense of chance and faith. Not only the boots are being invigorated when the solider puts them on, but so is the solider. On page 279, the narrator says, "Muller is dead... Before he died he handed over his pocket-book to me, and bequeathed me his boots the same that he once inherited from Kemmerich. I wear them, for they fit me quite well. After me Tjaden will get them, I have promised them to him." With the inheritance to the “heir loom” of Kemmerich’s boots, the new solider that is wearing them receives life, and the soul of the fallen solders still lay in the threads and laces of the

Show More
Related
719 Words | 3 Pages

Literary Analysis on Short Stories In the short story of Tim O'brien's The Things They Carried uses symbolism to suggest that items that the soldiers Kiowa, Lavender and Cross carried represent their values and where they come from. O'brien successfully shows in depth what each character mentioned in the short story represents in relation to the narrator by mentioning the items and memories that each individual carried.

Read More
826 Words | 4 Pages

These themes are exemplified by the experiences of the narrator in “Ten Kliks South” and Tina Beller in her e-mail to her parents. The major takeaway from these two pieces is that soldiers undergo tough situations that are unknown to the average human being. Just like everyday humans face the trials and tribulations of life, soldiers too come face to face with situations that can leave an emotional scar. Therefore, it is important for us to show appreciation for soldiers, for all that they do, and for all that they will continue to do for

Read More
1010 Words | 5 Pages

At some point, all people must accept the harsh truth of mortality. When people realize it for the first time, they can go through a change in character. The young medic Rat Kiley, a character in Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried, exemplifies this. His reaction to the sudden death of his best friend Curt Lemon, as portrayed in “How to Tell a True War Story,” depicts the shift of character that accompanies loss. Moreover, it reflects the inability of soldiers to return to normalcy after experiencing the traumas of grief.

Read More
957 Words | 4 Pages

When a gear has been fully developed and created it is moved from the assembly line into a machine. This machine slowly begins to wear at the gear and degrade it. By the end of its time in the machine, the gear is nearly unrecognizable, rusted and disfigured. Much like a gear and its machine, soldiers are often left unrecognizable by war. In Tim O’Brien’s, The Things They Carried, the author depicts stories from his time in vietnam and his time after.

Read More
1280 Words | 6 Pages

The reader may feel the injustice that the soldier in Purgatory is suffering over as well as the rest of the veterans that are in a similar predicament. Dead or alive, the veterans receive the short end of the stick. Furthermore, allusion is again used when the soldier describes his encounter with the social worker who is separating his

Read More
731 Words | 3 Pages

The book, All Quiet On The Western Front, by Erich Remarque, tells what happens to a group of German teenagers during World War I. Throughout this novel, Remarque has certain symbols for objects in the book that represent or mean something. For example, Kemmerich’s boots symbolized death. That’s just one example but there are a bunch more symbols and they all have connections to each other.

Read More
990 Words | 4 Pages

The lives of soldiers, Norman Bowker and Curt Lemon, illustrate how the war pressures the human spirit to a standard it can’t resemble. The pressure and responsibilities of lost friends and lost acts of courage heavily weigh Norman Bowker down,

Read More
972 Words | 4 Pages

All Quiet on The Western Front, written by Erich Maria Remarque, is a novel composed after World War One to convey the experiences of German soldiers during this horrific time of fighting. He brought to light many important issues that occur during wars. In this book, three horrors of war that had the largest impact were the lack of sanitation in the trenches, the loss of comrades, and the shock that came from unexpected and ongoing shelling. The lack of sanitation in the trenches caused many diseases, infections, and terrible memories to me made.

Read More
1667 Words | 7 Pages

All Quiet on the Western Front is a story, in which it allows people to know the true horrors of war. Throughout the story and in Erich Maria Remarque’s writing he uses many literary devices to emphasize what he experienced and the emotions he felt. The devices that he used are used in order to help the readers understand his experience and emphasize the theme of his war novel. Throughout this essay, I will show you a few of the literary devices used within the novel that emphasized the theme, the brutality of war. Within this essay you will learn about imagery, metaphors, and symbolism.

Read More
665 Words | 3 Pages

From the first few pages, it reveals that Second Company has made it out of a battle, losing close to half their men. Soon after, we see a detailed description of Kemmerich’s death, a fellow soldier injured and amputated before the beginning of the story. The way his fellow soldiers reacted, not with apathy yet not with unbridled misery, immediately sets the tone for the book. Other scenes throughout the

Read More
1106 Words | 5 Pages

Soldiers were not viewed as brave men risking their lives, and the war was seen as an unnecessary event. This type of mentality is seen in the novel with the perceptions of the soldiers. The narrator expresses the view of the time period when he states, “They were soldiers’ coats. Billy was the only one who had a coat from a dead civilian” (82). The meaning behind this is very crucial because it establishes a definite division between soldiers and civilians.

Read More
747 Words | 3 Pages

O’Brien’s intended audience was young people who were not educated about the war and he discussed the themes shame/guilt and mortality/death. The chapter “The Things They Carried” gives an introduction about the men in the group, it also shows shame/guilt. The chapter talks about the equipment each soldier carried and how it affected them. During this chapter it focuses primarily on LT.

Read More
930 Words | 4 Pages

Millions of people have gone through life-altering experiences in their time in World War I. In Erich Maria Remarque’s novel, All Quiet on the Western Front, Paul Bäumer, a 19-year-old German soldier, narrates his personal memoirs of this war. He describes the mental change and suffering he goes through as he is forced to mature from a young boy to a soldier in order to survive, leaving him permanently scarred from the throes of war. By employing juxtaposition to contrast Paul’s mindset, before and after the war, Remarque demonstrates how the mental health of the World War I soldiers is damaged because of the abrupt loss of their youth, leaving them in a state of survival and mental instability.

Read More
999 Words | 4 Pages

Over all, this story allows us to observe changes within the mentalities of army officers. First, the trauma of living in a war zone can add a significant amount of intangible weight into someone’s life. In “The Things They Carried,” we discover that Cross’s men “carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die (443).” Given that the majority of humans have experienced some form of trauma, we can understand how some men were driven to suicide and others into

Read More
702 Words | 3 Pages

Tim O'Brien's “The Things They Carry,” tells a story about the lives of young men during war. The narrator tells his story from first person, marking all of his adventures and experiences of his companions. O’Brien crafts his piece through the use of repetition, symbolism, and metaphors to convey the idea of physical and psychological hardships of soldiers during war. Though the literary device of repetition, O'Brien portrays the physical and psychological hardships of a soldier.

Read More

More about All Quiet On The Western Front Boots Symbolism

Related Topics

Open Document