Would it be difficult to live in horrible conditions, watch your closest friends die violently, and be afraid of dying at any moment? In all Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque the soldiers who lived through the First World War endured this in a very terrifying period of time All Quiet on the Western Front, men must be willing to sacrifice everything for nothing everything for nationalistic ideas Their great sacrifice proves to have many effects on their lives. In the novel All Quiet on the Western Front numerous connections, literary devices and plot elements show the cost of sacrifice and the effects of the war on plagiarism Get a custom essay on “Why shouldn't violent video games be banned"? Get an original essay First of all, All Quiet on the Western Front presented many central ideas related to current issues such as the ruinous effect war has. about the soldiers who fight it. The soldiers are constantly in danger because they could be killed or blown up at any moment. This intense danger also acts as an attack on the soldiers' nerves, forcing them to face instinctive fear at every moment. “I'm young, I'm twenty; yet I know nothing about life other than desperation, death, fear and fatuous superficiality thrown into an abyss of pain. I see how people turn against each other and silently, unknowingly, stupidly, obediently, innocently kill each other. This quote shows the effect of the panic-filled conditions of the soldiers. The only way for soldiers to survive war is to disconnect their emotions, suppress their feelings, and accept the conditions of their lives. Another connection present throughout the novel is the depiction of nationalism and political power. All Quiet on the Western Front presents the idea of ​​nationalism as an empty ideology, used by those in power to control a nation. Paul and his friends are inspired to become soldiers by nationalist ideas, but the experience of fighting quickly educates them about the irrelevance of nationalism in the face of the horrors of war. «It's strange, when you think about it, Kropp continues, that we are here to protect our homeland. And the French are there to protect their homeland. Now who's right? Remarque illustrates that soldiers at the front fight not for the glory of their nation but rather for the love of the country. They believe that winning the war will make the winner more nationalistic. Additionally, in All Quiet on the Western Front there were numerous examples of figurative language in the novel. In an example of personifying the impending bombardment, a soldier's connection to the Earth is shown as vital and similar to a mother's love. “To no man does the land mean so much as to the soldier... she is his only friend, his brother, his mother; he stifles his terror and his cries in her silence and security; she protects him and frees him for ten seconds to live, to run, ten seconds of life. Earth is the soldiers' most reliable protector on whom they can always rely. No one else can have a soldier's relationship with the Earth. In another example of figurative language, Paul had just stabbed the French soldier and felt empathy for him. «Comrade, I didn't want to kill you. If you jumped in here again, I wouldn't do it, if you were even reasonable. It was that abstraction that lived in my mind and elicited its appropriate response. It was that abstraction that I stabbed. But now, for the first time, I see that you are a man like me." In the simile Paul hesitated and stabbed the soldier.