Every soldier is affected by war. They are changed and shaped by the situations that they are placed in on the battlefield. This idea is especially exemplified during The Great War. Each soldier was confronted with a multitude of unfamiliar weapons and feelings that they had never experienced before. Despite the fact that Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front and Thomas Hardy’s “The Man he Killed” were written with the perspectives of separate soldiers in mind, the characters’ perception of war and their overall experience remains the same. After the Speaker from the poem and Paul Baumer experience close hand combat, they both battle feelings of guilt and uncertainty. While Paul was hiding in the shell hole during his scouting escapade, …show more content…
Due to the violence of his actions, Paul experienced a forced rite of passage as he lost even more of his innocence. Moreover, as this was Paul’s first experience at close hand combat, he battled his internal feelings. “Every gasp [laid] [his] heart bare” as Paul watched Duval slowly die in front of him” (Remarque 221). Paul obtained a sense of guilt and uncertainty of what to do because he had never been in that particular situation before. The Speaker possessed similar emotions when he was narrating his experience. While confessing his story, he said “I shot him dead because-Because he was my foe” (Hardy 9-10). The repetition of the word “because” and the hyphen exemplify the Speaker’s feelings of uncertainty. The Speaker had never thought about the situation before and when thinking back on it, he …show more content…
Paul addresses his acceptance of the Kaiser’s authority when he is describing the Russian prisoners at his training camp. He sees their pitiful faces up close and wonders how they could possibly be his enemies. However, he then accepts the fact that “a word of command [had] made these silent figures [his] enemies” (Remarque 193). He does not try to go against the orders of his ruler, and instead he follows it without question. Paul follows his leader without inquiring if the order is right or wrong. The Speaker from the poem displays similar actions when he is discussing how he acts differently in war. He states that if the enemy and himself had met “by some old ancient inn, [they] should have set [themselves] down to wet” (Hardy 2-3). He knows that if he and the enemy were not fighting in war and did not have an authority figure imposing rules upon them, they would have not been fighting. However, he goes on to state that since they were both “ranged as infantry…I shot at him as he at me” (Hardy 5-7). The Speaker’s words demonstrate how his actions are governed by the authority figures. He recognizes that he would easily kill the same person he could have been friends with if his leader ordered him