Analysis Of Vozdvizhensky's All Quiet On The Western Front

This part of the novel shifts from Yury’s perspective after he is abducted by the forest army to provide context into the military dynamics in the midst of the civil war. This part of the novel humanizes soldiers on both sides of the war by exploring various characters on the Siberian front. The beginning of the chapter takes place the Vozdvizhensky Monastery during the “Holy Week” establishing a timeline of events based around the holidays of Russian Orthodoxy. While the monastery is now an abandoned ruin, the men of the village now look to the walls to read “the decree of the Supreme Ruler [Kolchak] pasted on the walls” which lists those who have been conscripted into the war (Pasternak 365). This symbolizes the abandonment of the old religious Russia, to the new Russia where …show more content…
The character also seems nostalgic of old Russia as she holds her religious statues and expresses her resentment for the revolution that has dragged her husband and son into war. The chapter then shifts between a camp of Communist soldiers and then a camp of soldiers who fight for the Whites. It becomes entirely apparent that soldiers on both sides of this conflict are more alike then different. There is much bickering between the men in both camps and it seems as if no-one really understand what they are fighting for. While Liberius appears to have a problem with the communist ideologues in the Bolshevik camp, Galuzin also disagrees with the anti-communist rhetoric of the men he is fighting with and ultimately decides that he doesn’t want to go to war and ultimately abandons his post. This chapter in Doctor Zhivago ultimately adds dimension to the conflict on the Siberian Front, giving the reader context into the conditions of soldiers there before Zhivago arrives there