In Erich Maria Remarque’s 1928 novel on the German soldiers extreme physical and mental stress during World War I, All Quiet On The Western Front, one acquires the contradictory knowledge of war being powerful whether it have high power in level of enlightenment, level of instruction, or power of destroyance and ultimately dehumanization. Throughout this excerpt, the demonstration of both hurt and hope via animalistic instincts within the men on the front lines will occur.
In hopes of displaying how the war has led the men on the front lines to give greater usage to their Id, rather than their Ego or Superego, throughout the novel, the soldiers animalistic actions and instincts are used by Remarque. Both the tangible, and the intangible biological necessities and animalistic
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Unlike their normal lives at home, during war, these men are brainwashed into being constantly alert as well as being brainwashed into being constantly prepared to protect themselves from being killed, even if that means that they have to do the killing. On the Front Lines, the intangible that holds the greatest value and is exceptionally limited, is life. Throughout Remarque’s novel, one learns that both Paul, and the comrades among him, only wish “to live at any price; so [they] cannot burden [themselves] with feelings which though they might be ornament enough in peacetime, would be out of place here” (Remarque 139). Each soldier may not have acquired this knowledge at home, but they certainly have after living and dying on the Front Lines. Due to the lack of concern for morals on the Front Lines, both the Ego and the Superego are surpressed by Paul and his fellow comrades throughout this terrible war. The longer a man thinks about what is right and what is wrong, the shorter time he has to live before his life is gone right before his own, and his fellow’s own eyes. The