We are not youth any longer. We don’t want to take the world by storm. We are fleeing. We fly from ourselves. From our life. We were eighteen and had begun to love life and the world; and we had to shoot it to pieces. Erich Maria Remarque More Quotes by Erich Maria Remarque More Quotes From Erich Maria Remarque With blinded eyes I stared at the sky, this grey, endless sky of a crazy god, who had made life and death for his amusement. Erich Maria Remarque crazy eye sky No matter how improbable an assertion is, if it is made with enough assurance it has an affect. Erich Maria Remarque enough matter made We were all at once terribly alone; and alone we must see it through. Erich Maria Remarque Am I jealous? he thought, astonished. Jealous of the chance object to which she has attached herself? Jealous of something that does not concern me? One can be jealous of a love that has turned away, but not of that to which it has turned. Erich Maria Remarque jealous chance doe Someone said to me once that a cigarette at the right moment is better than all the ideals in the world. Erich Maria Remarque cigarette moments world ... but that's what mankind is like: they only prize what they no longer possess. Erich Maria Remarque prize mankind Mirrors are there when we are and yet they never give anything back to us but our own image. Never, never shall we know what they are when they are alone or what is behind them. Erich Maria Remarque behinds mirrors giving Courage is the fairest adornment of youth. Erich Maria Remarque adornment youth A man can gasp out his life beside you-and you feel none of it. Pity, Sympathy, sure-but you don't feel the pain. Your belly is whole and that's what counts. A half-yard away someone's world is snuffled out in roaring agony-and you feel nothing. That's the misery of the world. Erich Maria Remarque agony pain men Come let me kiss you. Life was never so precious as today— when it meant so little. Erich Maria Remarque kissing littles today But now, for the first time, I see you are a man like me. I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late. Why do they never tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are just as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, and the same dying and the same agony - forgive me, comrade; how could you be my enemy? Erich Maria Remarque mother men hands The things men did or felt they had to do. Erich Maria Remarque felt men We are little flames poorly sheltered by frail walls against the storm of dissolution and madness, in which we flicker and sometimes almost go out…we creep in upon ourselves and with big eyes stare into the night…and thus we wait for morning. Erich Maria Remarque wall eye morning Give 'em all the same grub and all the same pay/And the war would be over and done in a day." - All Quiet On The Western Front, Ch. 3 Erich Maria Remarque would-be giving war I wandered through the streets thinking of all the things I might have said and might have done had I been other than I was. Erich Maria Remarque done might thinking I want to think and at the same time that's the last thing in the world I want to do. Erich Maria Remarque want world thinking Sometimes I used to think that one day i should wake up, and all that had been would be over. forgotten, sunk, drowned. Nothing was sure - not even memory. Erich Maria Remarque one-day memories thinking 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. Erich Maria Remarque army expression sleep No soldier outlives a thousand chances. But every soldier believes in Chance and trusts his luck. Erich Maria Remarque veterans-day soldier believe In any case, the bayonet isn't as important as it used to be. It's more usual now to go into the attack with hand-grenades and your entrenching tool. The sharpened spade is a lighter and more versatile weapon - not only can you get a man under the chin, but more to the point, you can strike a blow with a lot more force behind it. That's especially true if you can bring it down diagonally between the neck and the shoulder, because then you can split down as far as the chest. When you put a bayonet in, it can stick, and you have to give the other man a hefty kick in the guts to get it out. Erich Maria Remarque blow men war
