The Experiences Of A World War 1 Soldier

Essay by EssaySwap ContributorHigh School, 11th grade February 2008

download word file, 2 pages 0.0

Downloaded 5641 times

The World War I writings reveal a lot about the soldiers' emotional and psychological experience. The soldiers had to witness a lot terrible things and many soldiers experienced shellshock. The war caused soldiers to be alienated from society. The war forced soldiers to disregard their emotions and their civilization. The soldiers were forced to put on a false front. They had to tell people that the war was good and pretend it was an honor to fight in the war. These experiences are shown in the novel All Quiet on the Western Front, the movie The Great War, and the poems of Siegfried Sassoon.

The soldiers had to witness and endure many terrible things. Many soldiers experienced shellshock. In All Quiet on the Western Front, bombing and shooting constantly surrounded the soldiers. The soldiers saw killing all around them and it changed their lives forever. Siegfried Sassoon's poem the Dreamers showed the horrible things the soldiers witnessed.

In this poem the soldier saw their comrades being eaten by rats. The movie The Great War showed many soldiers who suffered from shellshock.

The soldiers were alienated from society. The war caused the soldiers to change emotionally and psychologically. These changes affected the soldier greatly. The soldier would never again fit into society. In All Quiet on the Western Front, Paul takes a leave from the front. While Paul is on leave, he realizes that he has changed. His clothes did not fit anymore and he no longer enjoyed his books the way he used to. He realized that he did not fit into society and that he would never be able to fit into society.

War caused the soldiers to disregard their emotions and their civilization. The soldiers saw death so often. They were forced to disregard their feelings. The soldiers could not show compassion for their dying comrades nor could they show remorse for the people they killed. If they had let their emotions play a role then the emotions would have weakened them. To survive on the front they had to block out all of their emotions. They could no longer act civilized. The soldiers had to do whatever they could to survive.

Society's idea of war was different from that of the soldiers. Society viewed war as a glorious and honorable thing. The soldiers saw and experienced the hardships of war and felt that it is a horrible and unnecessary event. This is evident in Siegfried Sasson's poem Suicide in the Trenched and in All Quiet on the Western Front. In Suicide in the Trenches the speaker comments on the cheering of the crowds when soldiers walk bye. The speaker ends by saying "sneak home and pray you'll never know the hell where youth and laughter go." In All Quiet on the Western Front while Paul is on leave, Paul has a conversation with his father. The two of them discuss the war. Paul's father wants to know details about hand-to-hand combat and other macho things of that sort. Paul does not want to talk about these things so he leaves.

All Quiet on the Western Front, the poems by Siegfried Sassoon, and the movie The Great War all reveal a lot about the soldiers' emotional and psychological experience. The soldiers witnessed many terrible things. Some soldiers experienced shellshock. The war caused the soldiers to be alienated from society. It also caused them to disregard their emotions and to loose their civilization. Society's idea of war differed from that of the soldiers. This forced the soldiers to pretend that war was good when they were around people who did not see the hardships of war first hand. All of these things combined to change the soldiers' lives forever.