50 Fun Facts About All Quiet on the Western Front

What is Paul reaching for when a sniper kills him in the 1930 film All Quiet on the Western Front?

A butterfly just beyond the trench draws Paul's hand over the sandbags, an ending the novel does not have. The 1979 TV version has him sketching a bird instead.

Which belongings of the mortally wounded Franz Kemmerich does Müller covet in All Quiet on the Western Front?

His boots are English airman's boots of soft yellow leather, and they outlive one owner after another. Kemmerich's watch, by contrast, is stolen while he lies unconscious.

In All Quiet on the Western Front, Albert Kropp wants ministers and generals to fight with clubs, dressed in what?

Bathing drawers are the costume in Kropp's plan to turn a declaration of war into a public festival with tickets and bands, like a bullfight. Whoever survives the arena wins for his country.

What did Joseph Goebbels's rioters set loose in Berlin cinemas showing the 1930 film All Quiet on the Western Front?

White mice ran loose while stink bombs and sneezing powder filled the air, and the riots worked. German authorities banned the film in response.

Which document describes the day Paul Bäumer dies with the single sentence 'All Quiet on the Western Front'?

An army report covering the whole line has no space for one soldier, which is the irony of the title. Paul falls in October 1918, only weeks before the war ended.

What must Paul Bäumer scrub the Corporals' Mess with during training in All Quiet on the Western Front?

A toothbrush is one of the drill corporal's pettier punishments. He also sets Paul and Kropp to clear snow from the barrack square with a hand-broom and a dustpan.

Which streaming service released the German-language 2022 film All Quiet on the Western Front, winner of four Oscars?

Netflix put it online in October 2022, weeks after a festival premiere in Toronto. Its four Oscars included the international feature prize for Germany.

Which bird do Paul Bäumer and Kat steal from a headquarters shed and roast in All Quiet on the Western Front?

A goose, roasted for hours in a deserted lean-to while the guns thunder nearby, gives Paul and Kat one of the novel's gentlest scenes of friendship.

In All Quiet on the Western Front, the screams of which wounded creatures horrify the soldiers during a bombardment?

Horses, says the farmer of the group, are the vilest thing to use in a war, and he begs for the wounded ones to be shot. Paul hears in their cries 'the moaning of the world'.

All Quiet on the Western Front opens by calling itself neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all what?

An adventure is the last thing the book wants to be, 'for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it'. The short note sets the tone before the story begins.

Which schoolmaster's patriotic lectures march Paul Bäumer's whole class off to enlist in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Kantorek is later called up himself as a lowly Territorial, and one of his former pupils takes great pleasure in drilling him on the parade ground.

Which grand name does a former teacher's letter give Paul Bäumer's class in All Quiet on the Western Front?

The Iron Youth is how he flatters them from the safety of home, and the three who hear it only smile bitterly. None of them is over twenty, yet Paul feels their youth is long gone.

Which former postman is the feared drill corporal who trains Paul Bäumer's class in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Himmelstoss, the 'terror of Klosterberg', is proud of being the strictest disciplinarian in camp. His recruits take revenge one night by throwing a bedcover over him and thrashing him.

What is the peacetime trade of Kat, the forty-year-old scrounger of Paul's group in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Cobbler is only Paul's guess, because Kat 'understands all trades'. When food runs short, he strolls off and returns with two loaves and a sandbag of horseflesh.

The 1930 film All Quiet on the Western Front was the first to pair the directing Oscar with which other award?

Best Picture, then called Outstanding Production, went to Universal's Carl Laemmle. It was also the first winner of that prize to be based on a finished novel.

Where is Paul Bäumer hiding when a French soldier tumbles in and Paul stabs him in All Quiet on the Western Front?

A shell hole in no man's land traps Paul for hours beside the man he has stabbed, and he has to watch him die slowly. It is the first time he has killed someone with his own hands.

Which illness does Paul Bäumer's mother have when he comes home on leave in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Cancer keeps her in bed for much of his leave, yet she has saved a jar of whortleberries for him and presses two pairs of underpants on him as he goes.

What does Paul Bäumer call 'the finest thing that arose out of the war' in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Comradeship, Paul says, grew out of the bullying of the parade ground, which taught the recruits to stick together. He first calls it a practical sense of esprit de corps.

Which farmer in Paul Bäumer's company deserts after seeing a cherry tree in blossom in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Detering thinks only of his farmyard and his wife, and the blossom is too much for him. He makes straight for Germany, which is hopeless, and the military police catch him.

Which creatures does Paul Bäumer's unit bait with bread and kill by torchlight in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Rats so fat the men call them corpse-rats gnaw at every loaf. One soldier reads their growing numbers as a sure sign that a bombardment is coming.

Why does Paul Bäumer's company get double rations in the opening chapter of All Quiet on the Western Front?

Nearly half were casualties: the cook had drawn food and tobacco for 150 men, and only 80 returned from the line. Ginger, the cook, has to be argued into serving it all out.

Which part of Germany does Tjaden say 'cannot offend' its French equivalent in All Quiet on the Western Front?

A mountain cannot be insulted, Tjaden reasons, so he fails to see how one country offends another. He decides he has no business at the war, since he does not feel offended himself.

Whose review of Paul Bäumer's regiment brings new uniforms, soon returned, in All Quiet on the Western Front?

The Kaiser disappoints Paul, who expected a bigger man with a thundering voice. He hands out medals, and the visit sets the soldiers arguing about who actually wants a war.

Gérard Duval, the Frenchman Paul Bäumer kills in All Quiet on the Western Front, earned his living as what?

A printer, Paul learns from the dead man's pocketbook, which also holds snapshots of a woman and a little girl. He promises the corpse that he will write to the wife.

According to Paul Bäumer in All Quiet on the Western Front, what means more to a soldier than to any other man?

The earth is 'his only friend, his brother, his mother' when a soldier presses himself into it. He buries his face and limbs in it from the fear of death by shellfire.

Which Remarque novel, a sequel to All Quiet on the Western Front, follows soldiers who survived the war into peacetime?

The Road Back came out in 1931, and two years later the Nazis burned it alongside the first book. A third novel set after the war later completed a loose trilogy.

Lew Ayres, who played Paul in the 1930 film All Quiet on the Western Front, declared himself what in World War II?

A conscientious objector from 1942, Ayres still went to war as a medic, landing under fire at Leyte. He gave his service pay to the Red Cross.

In the 2022 film All Quiet on the Western Front, Daniel Brühl's character, absent from the novel, negotiates what?

The armistice talks are led by Matthias Erzberger, a real German politician. The film cuts between his train to Compiègne and the trenches.

Prisoners of which nationality does Paul Bäumer guard at a camp on the moors in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Russian prisoners pick over the garbage tins for scraps, and Paul finds he cannot see them as enemies. He breaks each of his cigarettes in two and shares them out.

Where does a bombardment catch Paul Bäumer's unit after a night laying wire in All Quiet on the Western Front?

A graveyard gives the only cover, and the explosions heave coffins out of the ground around the living. Paul crawls under one for shelter, then struggles into his mask as the gas rolls in.

Which giant peat-digger in Paul Bäumer's company would sooner stay a soldier in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Haie Westhus reckons twelve years as an NCO and a pension beat digging peat on the moors. He never gets the chance: he is dragged off with a wound so deep that the lung shows.

Which favourite dish is cooking when Paul Bäumer walks in on home leave in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Potato cakes are frying as he climbs the stairs, and the smell tells him it must be Saturday. Later his squad makes its own at a supply dump, grating the potatoes on a pot lid punched with a nail.

What comforting lie about her son's death does Paul Bäumer tell Kemmerich's mother in All Quiet on the Western Front?

He died at once, shot through the heart, is the story Paul swears to when she presses him. In truth Kemmerich faded slowly in a field hospital after an amputation.

What kills Kat while Paul Bäumer is carrying him to a dressing station in All Quiet on the Western Front?

A splinter in the head, so tiny that Paul never notices it strike, kills his closest friend. Only when an orderly says 'he is stone dead' does Paul find the one small wound.

In All Quiet on the Western Front, Paul Bäumer says soldiers nearing the front line turn 'on the instant' into what?

Human animals survive, Paul explains, because instinct is far quicker and surer than conscious thought. The same men were marching up as moody or good-tempered soldiers minutes earlier.

What does Albert Kropp, the clearest thinker in Paul's class, lose in hospital in All Quiet on the Western Front?

His leg is taken off at the thigh in a Catholic hospital, and for a while he talks of shooting himself. The stump heals, and he is due to move on to an institute for artificial limbs.

All Quiet on the Western Front is called a tribute to which group, named in a phrase Ernest Hemingway popularised?

The Lost Generation was Gertrude Stein's label for those who came of age in the First World War, borrowed by Hemingway for a 1926 epigraph. Paul's own verdict on his friends is 'I believe we are lost'.

Which leading lady of Charlie Chaplin's Modern Times married the author of All Quiet on the Western Front?

Paulette Goddard married Remarque in 1958 and stayed with him until his death in 1970. His earlier romances had included Marlene Dietrich and Hedy Lamarr.

What is the literal English meaning of Im Westen nichts Neues, the German title of All Quiet on the Western Front?

Nothing New in the West became something freer in A. W. Wheen's 1929 translation. His title has since passed into English as an idiom for a lull or a stalemate.

In All Quiet on the Western Front, Paul Bäumer calls his friends 'forlorn like children, and experienced like' whom?

Old men at twenty is the paradox Paul keeps returning to. In the same breath he calls himself and his friends crude, sorrowful and superficial.

Which star of The Waltons played Paul Bäumer in the 1979 television film All Quiet on the Western Front?

Richard Thomas, an Emmy winner for that series, starred opposite Ernest Borgnine as Kat. The production was shot largely in Czechoslovakia and won a Golden Globe.

Which British singer recorded a song called All Quiet on the Western Front for his album Jump Up!?

Elton John wrote it with lyricist Bernie Taupin for a 1982 album that also holds Empty Garden, his tribute to John Lennon.

What do patients in All Quiet on the Western Front call the place beside the lift where hopeless cases are sent?

The Dying Room has two beds and sits handily next to the mortuary lift. One patient, Peter, is wheeled off to it protesting and, to the whole ward's amazement, comes out alive.

What does Paul Bäumer hurl into a hospital corridor to stop the nuns' morning prayers in All Quiet on the Western Front?

A bottle smashes into a thousand pieces and the praying stops. Josef Hamacher takes the blame, because an earlier blow has earned him a certificate saying he is not always responsible for his actions.

Which card game do Paul Bäumer and his friends play on a margarine-tub lid in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Skat, Germany's national card game, was devised in Altenburg around 1810 for three players. Paul's group plays it everywhere from the latrine meadow to the hospital ward.

Which plump classmate of Paul Bäumer, reluctant to enlist, is among the first to fall in All Quiet on the Western Front?

Behm is hit in the eye and left for dead, then seen crawling about no man's land, unable to see. He is shot down before anyone can fetch him in.

What cut short Remarque's own few weeks in the trenches, the experience behind All Quiet on the Western Front?

Shrapnel injuries to the neck and limbs sent him to a military hospital in Duisburg in July 1917. Like his hero, he had served in a 2nd Company.

Which director used his own hand for the last shot of the 1930 film All Quiet on the Western Front?

Lewis Milestone filmed the ending during editing, when his star was no longer available. The film brought him his second Academy Award for directing.

In which German city was Remarque, the author of All Quiet on the Western Front, born into a bookbinder's family?

Osnabrück is also where he went after the war to finish training as a teacher, a job he soon gave up. He was born Erich Paul Remark and later took the French spelling of the family name.

Which German newspaper first serialised All Quiet on the Western Front, weeks before it appeared as a book?

Vossische Zeitung, a liberal Berlin daily, ran the story in instalments in late 1928. The book followed in January 1929 and sold 2.5 million copies within eighteen months.