How was dehumanization an essential part of All Quiet on the Western Front and being a soldier in World War I? The book All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque is the account of the character Paul Baumer and his classmates who serve in World War I that illuminates the horrors of the war from the German perspective. Dehumanization is the greatest theme of the story; it defines every soldier and their way of life before, during, and after the war. It is seen in how the soldiers handle death and the grueling training they endure. The soldiers treat death in a way that is appalling to the average civilian. They simply brush away the death and move on as though nothing has happened. Paul reasons, "Here, on the boarders of death, life follows an amazingly simple course, it is limited to what is most necessary, all else lies buried in gloomy sleep;-- in …show more content…
In one instance they relentlessly abused Himmelstoss, the corporal in charge of them, by disabling him with a bed sheet and beating him; "He put himself in position with evident satisfaction, raised his arm like a signal-mast and his hand like a coal-shovel and fetched such a blow on the white sack as would have felled an ox"(48). They did this as a reaction to previous incidences where Himmelstoss had acted in barbaric and boorish ways as means of training. An example: "Kropp and I were given the job of clearing the barrack-square of snow with a hand-broom and a dust-pan" (23). The corporals dehumanize men throughout the book in non-equitable ways. In one example an old schoolmate of Paul, Kantorek, has become a superior officer of the man who forcibly recruited Paul and his comrades. Kantorek makes the man rush back and forth across the barracks until he is nearly crippled. Kantorek fosters the idea of dehumanization when he treats the man as a toy for