-why Does A Man Live?

He Fell In October 1918, On A Day That Was So Quiet And Still On The Whole Front, That The Army Report Confined Itself To The Single Sentence: All Quiet On The Western Front. He Had Fallen Forward And Lay On The Earth As Though Sleeping. Turning Him Over One Saw That He Could Not Have Suffered Long; His Face Had An Expression Of Calm, As Though Almost Glad The End Had Come.

It's All Rot That They Put In The War-news About The Good Humour Of The Troops, How They Are Arranging Dances Almost Before They Are Out Of The Front-line. We Don't Act Like That Because We Are In A Good Humour: We Are In A Good Humour Because Otherwise We Should Go To Pieces.

Come Let Me Kiss You. Life Was Never So Precious As Today— When It Meant So Little.

Kropp On The Other Hand Is A Thinker. He Proposes That A Declaration Of War Should Be A Kind Of Popular Festival With Entrance-tickets And Bands, Like A Bull Fight. Then In The Arena The Ministers And Generals Of The Two Countries, Dressed In Bathing-drawers And Armed With Clubs, Can Have It Out On Themselves. Whoever Survives The Country Wins. That Would Be Much Simpler And More Than Just This Arrangement, Where The Wrong People Do The Fighting

... Clothes Sometimes Gave One More Of A Lift Than Any Philosophic Comforting.