All Quiet On The Western Front Historical Analysis

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History is a concept that is an academic and systemic organisation of events; it relies heavily on the concept of authority and authorship. Memory, however, is heavily reliant on personal experience and the individual perception of an event; it is the faculty in which the mind stores information. The notion of truth in history and memory defined as the honesty and reliability either the spoken or written word, is highly debated in texts such as The True History of the Kelly Gang (True History) written by Peter Carey whereby truth is questioned heavily. In texts such as All Quiet on the Western Front (All Quiet) written by German author Erich Maria Remarque, questions of a historical event and the text itself has been questioned on its authenticity…show more content…
The concept of memory is prominent through Paul Bäumer’s, the narrator, voice. It is an evident part of the soldiers’ lives in the German trenches. Bäumer has memories of “being sent up the line as relief troops” and having “only eighty of us…back”. The individual memory in All Quiet is highly disputed as Remarque’s authenticity and truthfulness of the book and his representation is said to have glorified war slightly through “the wonderfully mindless hours” keys into the questioning of truth. However, individual memory is still heavily influential throughout the novel with “I can still remember” as a required element in the novel. Other elements of individual memory include personal experience, as it appears one would cease to exist without the…show more content…
During the story “the idea of authority- which is what they represented- implied deeper insights and a more humane wisdom” however, Bäumer’s use of the word “humane” provides an ironic hint to his definition and explanation of authority. Within the context of the war the notion of authority and authorship changes, from the innocent understanding of what it meant to a greater level of understanding that the older generation had failed the younger cohort due to their willingness to believe. The concern put forward through this, is to urge the younger generation in the novel to examine what the definition of truth is to them as the older generation has fallen short of doing so. The use of authority, personal experience and individual memory are also heavily relatable to True
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