Review Of Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet On The Western Front

In Nazi Germany the book All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque was banned. Millions of copies were burned and Remarque lost his German citizenship and fled the country. The Nazi party did not agree with anything that went against what the party was about and that was exactly what this book did. The Nazis objected to this because the book told how the soldiers truly felt about war and it told how awful it was on the front lines. As well as, Remarque felt as though the soldiers they were fighting were not truly their enemies. The Nazis wanted total power of Germany as well as to conquer neighboring countries. They used the charisma of their political leaders and when they had seized enough power the began to use brute strength to gain even more. When the Nazi Party’s leader, Adolf Hitler, became leader of Germany they …show more content…
They hated it and if others were to read this book they would probably hate war as well. Which was not what the Nazis wanted. They wanted eager and loyal soldiers who came to war for glory and fame. Which is exactly what Paul’s teacher Kantorek told them they’d get if they became soldiers and made them want to join. In chapter nine of All Quiet, Paul says, “"Bombardment, barrage, curtain-fire, mines, gas, tanks, machine-guns, hand-grenades--words, words, words, but they hold the horror of the world" (Remarque 132). Paul is saying this because he knows that these are just words to people who have not experienced these things. These people do not know the true terror they are. In Nazi Germany these were common words, as they were fighting a war. The Nazis did not want the German people to know the horror behind these words. All Quiet on the Western Front spoke of how many soldiers truly felt about the war and they didn’t want those Germans to feel the same way. So that they would fight for the Nazi