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What Is The Loss Of Innocence In All Quiet On The Western Front

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Lillian Johnson
English Honors lV
(ALWG) Context Connection
28 March 2023
All Quiet on the Western Front, directed by Edward Berger, is a film about the effects of war on young men. In 1914 war breaks out in Germany, Paul Baumer and some of his friends, excited would enlist quickly to serve. Not soon after they are drafted do they see the first images from the battlefield that show them the harsh reality of war. In comparison, a memoir written by
Ismael Beah is about a boy soldier and his traumatic experiences when war breaks out in his home country Sierra Leone. The loss of innocence is apparent as Ishmael experienced his first battle as a soldier. The life-altering, painful events that both young soldiers experience are
emotionally …show more content…

The circumstances that both boys end up in are life-altering, Ishmael’s whole world was changed, and his family was ripped apart and scattered when rebels raided his village during the war in Sierra Leone. His regular life was no more as he was thrown into a gory war, his innocence was finally lost when Ismael killed a man for the first time in chapter 13, “My face, my hands, my shirt and gun were covered with blood, I raised my gun and pulled the trigger, and
I killed a man” (119). Ishmael’s anger from losing his friends during this battle fueled him to kill every rebel in sight. Ishmael felt like someone else was controlling him as he “shot everything that moved” (119). Similarly, Paul Baumer in All Quiet on the Western Front enlisted to fight with the German army in World War I, the young soldier’s zealousness turns into horror as he comes face to face with the pointless acts of violence that follow with war. “Example”
Lillian 2
The effects of the war were apparent in the boys, both physically and emotionally traumatized by the events that changed their lives. Ishmael states that he began to feel nothing:
“Nothing happened in my head. It was void” The battle that occurred that day left him

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