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Erich Maria Remarque

Erich Maria Remarque Quotes

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Famous Erich Maria Remarque Quotes

“But now, for the first time, I see you are a man like me. I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late. Why do they never tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are just as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, and the same dying and the same agony - forgive me, comrade; how could you be my enemy?”

MenFirstsHandsFacesMotherPoorEnemyWifeDyingFrontsLateDevilFirst TimeForgivingLike MeToo LateYour FaceAnxiousAgonyFellowshipFear Of DeathComradeRiflesForgive MeGrenadeBayonets
Author:Erich Maria Remarque
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“This book is to be neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it. It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped shells, were destroyed by the war.”

MenTryingMayBookWarFacesGenerationsFrontsAdventureDestroyedConfessionShellsFace To FaceAccusation
Book:Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front
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“And even if these scenes from our youth were given back to us we would hardly know what to do. The tender, secret influence that passed from them into us could not rise again. We might be amongst them and move in them; we might remember and love them and be stirred by the sight of them. But it would be like gazing at the photograph of a dead comrade; those are his features, it is his face, and the days we spent together take on a mournful life in the memory; but the man himself it is not.”

IfsKnowsMenMightWould BeTogetherRememberFacesMovingGivenMemoriesSecretInfluenceYouthSceneAnd LoveSightPhotographFeaturesComradeGazing
Author:Erich Maria Remarque
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“We're no longer young men. We've lost any desire to conquer the world. We are refugees. We are fleeing from ourselves. From our lives. We were eighteen years old, and we had just begun to love the world and to love being in it; but we had to shoot at it. The first shell to land went straight for our hearts. We've been cut off from real action, from getting on, from progress. We don't believe in those things any more; we believe in the war.”

MenWorldYearsFirstsBelieveHeartWarRealActionYoungDesireLostOur LivesCuttingProgressLandDon't BelieveConquerYoung ManShellsRefugeeEighteenFleeingConquer The WorldEighteen Years Old
Author:Erich Maria Remarque
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“To no man does the earth mean so much as to the soldier. When he presses himself down upon her long and powerfully, when he buries his face and his limbs deep in her from the fear of death by shell-fire, then she is his only friend, his brother, his mother; he stifles his terror and his cries in her silence and her security; she shelters him and releases him for ten seconds to live, to run, ten seconds of life; receives him again and again and often forever.”

MenMeanLongDoeRunningEarthFacesMotherSilenceForeverFireSecurityCryBrotherTenPressesSoldierTerrorReleaseSecondsShelterAgain And AgainShellsLimbsFear Of Death
Book:All Quiet on the Western Front: A Novel
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“In any case, the bayonet isn't as important as it used to be. It's more usual now to go into the attack with hand-grenades and your entrenching tool. The sharpened spade is a lighter and more versatile weapon - not only can you get a man under the chin, but more to the point, you can strike a blow with a lot more force behind it. That's especially true if you can bring it down diagonally between the neck and the shoulder, because then you can split down as far as the chest. When you put a bayonet in, it can stick, and you have to give the other man a hefty kick in the guts to get it out.”

IfsMenGivingImportantWarHandsUsedForceBehindsCasesWeaponsToolsSticksBlowStrikesShouldersUsed To BeKicksNecksGutsChestsUsualSplitsChinsLightersGreat WarSpadesVersatileGrenadeBayonets
Author:Erich Maria Remarque
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“The soldier is on friendlier terms than other men with his stomach and intestines. Three-quarters of his vocabulary is derived from these regions, and they give an intimate flavour to expressions of his greatest joy as well as of his deepest indignation. It is impossible to express oneself in any other way so clearly and pithily. Our families and our teachers will be shocked when we go home, but here it is the universal language.”

MenWayGivingWellsHomeJoyThreeLanguageTermTeacherImpossibleExpressionUniversalSoldierOneselfOur FamilyIntimateRegionsStomachQuartersShockedVocabularyIndignationUniversal LanguageFlavourIntestines
Book:All quiet on the western front and related readings
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“The room shall speak, it must catch me up and hold me, I want to feel that I belong here, I want to hearken and know when I go back to the front line that the war will sink down, be drowned utterly in the great home-coming tide, know that it will then be past for ever, and not gnaw us continually, that it will have none but an outward power over us...Nothing stirs; listless and wretched, like a condemned man, I sit there and the past withdraws itself. And at the same time I fear to importune it too much, because I do not know what might happen then. I am a soldier, I must cling to that.”

KnowsMenWantFeelsWarHomeMightHappensPastSpeakLinesRoomsToo MuchFrontsSoldierTidesWretchedHold MeCatch Me
Author:Erich Maria Remarque
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