“Generals Die in Bed” shows that humans are totally dehumanised by war. Discuss. ‘Generals Die in Bed’, written by Charles Yale Harrison demonstrates the tremendous impact that war can have on an ordinary man and the dehumanising acts that this entails. It shows that the battle of war can test the dignity and morals of men and the emotional impact of this can further destroy that of comradeship and mateship. However, when all dignity and values seem lost, signs of their former selves can, and do return.
1. What attitude does Remarque exhibit toward World War I? Does he condemn war or glorify it? Erich Remarque’s novel All Quiet on the Western Front absolutely condemns war. The entire story is a constant reminder of the true horror that young soldiers on every side of the fight face each and every moment while at war.
Tim O’Brien, having experienced the Vietnam War, addresses the violence of war and its hellish, inherent effects on the people’s mind through portraying Paul Berlin as fearful and mad. Throughout the story, Paul was always seen expressing fear. At the beginning of the story, as Paul and the other soldiers were on their way to the ocean, he became too fearful and started regressing Paul pretended he was not a soldier, but an innocent boy doing a campfire while chatting with his father (page 131). Another example would be the time Paul started counting his steps and pretending they are dollar bills to fight fear, which shows he was fearful (page 134). The fact that Paul regresses and starts counting his steps, which shows before entering the war he was carefree and wasn’t used to fear, explains how the violent war poses such inherent effects on Paul’s mind by turning him from such a carefree, to a fearful person.
Nick Ogden Mr. Wilson English 12 5 November 2008 War: Man v. Man, or Animal v. Animal? Killing another human is a difficult task, but what if it was only the helmet being shot ay not the person wearing it? In the mind, would it be easier to try to “kill the helmet” than to think about ending another life forever? In All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque, there are multiple instances where his main character Paul uses animals as a metaphor to dehumanize war. When actually describing soldiers in a human form, it is only to express despair and regret.
The Horrors of War War has been around for many centuries from the very moment man started to become civilized. War has always been brutal and ruthless from the past all the way to the present. The epigraph of Erich Maria Remarque’s novel “All Quiet on the Western Front” states an accurate statement about war always leaving a soldier physically and emotionally destroyed. One main reason that makes this story so good, besides it being story of how life of a soldier is, is that it is being told in a first-person point of view. Remarque did an excellent job explaining the dangers soldiers had to go through.
Like Wilfred Owen, in Dulce et decorum est, Harrison’s intention is to awaken his readers to the new reality of War. The opening chapter portrays the new soldiers leaving Montreal for the first time as lost, unhappy and childish in their attempts to blot out their fears of what is to come. The parade to the train station is described in a series of fragmented images, in an atmosphere of bewilderment and degradation. From then on, the novel takes on the grinding, disciplined structure of military action followed by periods of rest. This structure helps to convey the unremitting sameness of war, and to enact the soldiers’ sense of unrelenting danger and boredom.
Before the War, Paul was a creative, sensitive, and passionate person, writing poems and having a clear love for his family. But as the war changed his attitude and personality, poems and other things of his past life become something Paul could not remember having any link to, and he learns to disconnect himself from his feelings. When Paul arrives at the Western Front with his friends and schoolmates, (Tjaden, Muller, Kropp, and Kaczynsky), they have to engage in frequent battles and endure the dangerous and often the horrible and bad conditions of warfare. After all that, Paul and his friends have realize that the ideals of nationalism and patriotism that Kantorek was telling them is simply not true. They no longer believe that war is
Alexander Walter Horst Period: 1 5/20/14 Oblivion WWI originally became known as the war to end all wars, however quite the opposite was transpired as only newfound tensions arose from this four-year long death bath. With innovations leading to deadlier weapons, the new style of war became the most deadliest of the time, and left an entire generation of young men destroyed, distraught, and traumatized by the experiences they were forced to endure. In the novel, All Quiet on the Western Front, written by Erich Maria Remarque and Wilfred Owen’s poems “Arms and the Boy” and “Dulce ET Decorum EST”, the absolute arbitrariness and irrationalness of war becomes apparent. War became a force imposed on the youthful men of the homeland, able to conquer them and shape them into an animalistic form, as they desperately fight for their comrades’ survival. Initially, having been convinced that war is a glorious act of patriotism, the writers felt downright betrayed by the previous generation, once coming to the haunting realization that war is the opposite of what had been conveyed to them.
Private Peaceful shows that while young men go to war to ‘prove themselves’, all they really prove is the futility of war. Do you agree? The novel ‘Private Peaceful’ by Michael Morpurgo shows that, even though young men go to war to prove themselves, all they prove is that war is completely futile. The novel shows this when it talks about the thousands of dead soldiers, the pointless attacks, and the post-script section of the novel. This incredible war story shows us that, even though they display great bravery and valour in battle, the only thing young men who fight in wars accomplish is an early death.
Sassoon uses blameful language to describe the ruthless of government in order to reveal the ugly hidden massage as settling the situation. At the beginning of the poem, he uses the phrase “simple” (l.1) to imply innocence, as well as using “solider boy” (l.1) to adumbrate the character is in his early age. The unfriendly government that currently send young soldiers into a dreadful condition. The phrase “crumps and lice” (l.6) describes the terrible hygienic conditions in the army environment. Lacking of aims in the army originates from the nerves and sadden, hence they need a way to relief, “lack of rum” (l.6) defines rum was given to troops, steadying nerves, increasing confidence and forget.