Chapter 1 Summary

Mari Navarro

John Beuning

Joseph  Albers

The chapter we decided to do is chapter one. This chapter is a brief introduction to the characters. This chapter begins with the men returning from the front line where they experience heavy losses, eighty men returned from the front line out of one hundred and fifty men. It then takes us to the men lining up at the cook house with Albert Kropp leading the way because he is the hungriest. What is left of the gang form the head of the queue, before the cook house. The cook comes out and claims he has prepared too much food and has too many rations due to soldiers lost at the front line. Kat convinces Heinrich to disperse all of the food and all of the rations after some jostling.

The men then reminisce of their times in school with their school master Kantorek. In their times at the school Kantorek often said to them, “won’t you join up, comrades?” this persuaded all of the boys who even hesitated to enlist in army. The men did not blame Kantorek for this decision. Kantorek glorified the war to help persuade the young men to enlist and left out the horrors of war. The first death the men seen shattered this belief of glory in war.

They go visit their friend Kemmerich who was wounded in battle and had his leg amputated. Their friend looks ghastly, yellow and pale. All the men recognize this as death working from within him. The men have a hard time because they know that he will die. Kemmerich doesn’t even realize that his leg is amputated due to being in extreme shock. After sympathizing with Kemmerich Muller than realizes Kemmerich won’t need his books so he questions him about the boots. Muller goes as far as lining up and checking the boot size with his own feet to see if they would fit. As morbid as it is, if the tables were turned the situation would occur other way as well. The men hate to see their friend in pain so they seek out and orderly to help rid his pain. They then ask him to give Kemmerich more morphine to ease his suffering in his last moments. The orderly refuses so the men bribe him with more and more cigarettes until he agrees to their request. Kropp goes with the orderly because he doesn’t trust him to deliver the morphine. Paul opens the letter he received from Kemmerich which reads,” we are the iron youth.”

Remarque, Erich Maria. All Quiet on the Western Front. N.p.: Propyläen Verlag, 1929. Print.