Chapter eight literary anylsis

“Sometimes by loosing the battle you find a new way to win the war.”

-Donald Trump

     War is waged by humans and dehumanized by humans. In the book All Quiet On the Western Front Chapter eight the Russian prisoners are treated horribly and unfairly. The Russians are war prisoners and the German soldiers can watch them through a fence. They are extremely malnourished because they don’t get fed enough and are not treated well. Everyday Paul sees more dying and getting buried because of this. In the first couple of days when Paul arrived at his new training he saw how little food they had and how unfairly treated they were. Over the next couple of days he started talking with some of the of Russians and even shared some of his food and cigars. 

“They have dysentery; furtively many of them display the blood-stained tails of their shirts. Their backs, their necks are bent, their knees sag, their heads droop as they stretch out their hands and beg in the few words of German that they know—beg with those soft, deep, musical voices, that are like warm stoves and cosy rooms at home.”

All Quiet On the Western Front Chapter VIII

These Russians are treated so badly that they literally die. All they would really need is to have a bit more food so that they could survive. But alas the leaders obviously don’t care enough and do not even give them enough food to survive. Since the Russians are going to be prisoners for a while maybe they should at least make their life a bit less miserable. They have to do labor and don’t get enough food to even live so it’s really just cruel.