90 pages • 3 hours read
Erich Maria RemarqueA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapter 1
Reading Check
1. Paul Bäumer
2. Kemmerich
Short Answer
1. Kantorek is the soldiers’ old teacher. He encouraged his young students to enlist in the war, and the young soldiers feel betrayed and resentful.
2. The soldiers discuss Kemmerich’s boots and who will get them if/when he dies of his injuries.
Chapter 2
Reading Check
1. A writer
2. Corporal Himmelstoss
Short Answer
1. He says that, as young men, they have not “taken root,” so the war has swept them away. By contrast, the war is more like an interruption to the older men, who are able to envision a life after it.
Chapter 3
Reading Check
1. Himmelstoss
Short Answer
1. He admires his “sixth sense,” his intelligence, and his inventiveness.
2. Himmelstoss punished Tjaden for wetting his bed by bunking him with another recruit who also wet his bed, and whoever was on the bottom bunk had “a vile time.”
Chapter 4
Reading Check
1. Muller
2. The searchlights
Short Answer
1. Detering is a farmer and has an affection for horses. He cannot bear to see and hear their suffering.
Chapter 5
Reading Check
1. Albert Kropp
2. Roasting a goose
Short Answer
1. His wife is left to look after the farm on her own, and it is almost harvesting season. Two of his horses have already been taken for the war effort.