Erich Maria Remarque ... He is really great for his humanity - a classic who was destined to write with a tormented soul in the terrible era of world wars ...
Initially, his name was pronounced as Erich Paul Remarque.
At the age of nineteen during World War I, he nearly became crippled due to five painful battle wounds. Doctors prophesied to him the short and joyless existence of a disabled person, but his
fortitude turned out to be stronger. However, the most terrible blow for Eric was the untimely death of his troubles and grief of his mother - a year later, after being wounded. Later, Remarkās quotes were used by biographers, describing the suffering he suffered: āMother is the most touching of all that is on earth. Mother means: forgive and sacrifice oneself. ā
Writer's Special Talent
As he told in his memoirs, in order to acquire a peculiar talisman during the period of heavy losses, one day the decision came: to replace āPaulā in his full name with his mother's name - Maria. Erich believed that this would further cherish in his life, a half-year schoolgirl, scorched by the war.
Originality and imagery of thinking was organically characteristic of this talented person. Perhaps that is why quotes from Remarque's books about love and war, about man and his feelings touch the souls of readers.
Sometimes the authorās thoughts are so polished, concise, concise, original, that they are immediately remembered by the reader, becoming aphorisms.
Remarque begins literary activity
He did not go through the greenhouse school of his youth. A strong body still recovered. After being wounded, he tried to take place as a musician, race car driver, and then as a journalist. At this time, he writes the first works, in style reminiscent of the tabloid press. However, after five years, his obvious professional growth can be traced : he is entrusted with a prestigious job in Europe - to be a correspondent for the Hanover edition of Echo Continental. It was a good school. Returning to Germany, he becomes editor of the weekly āSport im Bildā.
Creation by the author of the best novel in the world about World War I
Four years later, Remarque undertakes to write a novel that brought him fame and prosperity - "On the Western Front, without changes." The story of the outstanding prose master about those people who, tearing off from peaceful life, was pushed into the burning furnace of war, was forced to die by thousands, is realistic. Subsequently, the novel clearly opposed Hitlerās power, appealing to the humanism of readers, awakening their compassion and rejection of violence.
The author seemed to foresee the catastrophe of Germany in the 40s, telling about compatriots who had turned into cannon fodder. Critics admit that in world literature this novel is the best book about the First World War.
Its continuation - the book "Return" - spoke about the contemporaries of the writer, who, crippled physically and spiritually, having returned from the front to peaceful life, were unclaimed, restless.
Forced emigration
There are no prophets in their own country. Klikushi soon called the writer's works "disruptive." The humanist perception of the tragedy of military conflicts by the author clearly did not coincide with the Goebbels ideology of the National Socialists, who came to power in the 30s in Germany. According to the Nazis, his works āweakened the German spiritā, and Erich Maria Remarck himself became the āenemy of the Fuhrer."
The Nazis, in addition to barbarism, had nothing to oppose to the truth of Remark's honest story about the fate of his generation crippled by the war: his "treacherous" books were publicly burned. The writer, fearing reprisal, emigrates to Switzerland.
40 years of emigration ...
Was the writerās emigration coincidentally coinciding with the time that Moses searched for the āpromised landā for his people? Remarque proved himself outside the borders of his homeland not only as a writer - patriot, but also as a writer - philosopher. He himself wrote: "Time does not heal ...".
The classic shows in his novels to the whole world the true German spirit - the spirit of thinkers, humanists, toilers, deeply rethinking the tragedy of his homeland and his compatriots. The very spirit that made me speak later about the āGerman miracleā - the rapid revival of the country.
From Switzerland, he moves to France, then to Mexico, then to the USA. His "immigrant" novels - "Arc de Triomphe", "Night in Lisbon", "Love your neighbor" - become iconic in world literature. Contemporaries understand: Remarque writes classics.
His works are Three Comrades, Arc de Triomphe, Borrowed Life, Night in Lisbon. āThe Black Obeliskā, āTime to Live and Time to Dieā - are widely known and filmed. The thoughts stated by Remarck in them are quoted and relevant.
Each of Remarqueās novels is worthy of a separate article, but we have the opportunity to write in more detail about only one.
"Triumphal Arch"
The novel Arc de Triomphe was written by Remarque after the end of World War II in the United States, where he emigrated. Its foundation is the true story of a German emigrant, Dr. Fresenburg, who used the fake name Ravik abroad. At the same time, Remarque introduced a lot of personal into the image of the protagonist of the novel ...
This is a paradoxical book, because, despite the fact that its plot covered the years of the bloody war, love was its leitmotif. Love that is "not stained with friendship." In this work, not just the authorās style is felt, but the amazing power of his work. The story of the talented German surgeon Ravik, illegally staying in Paris and operating brilliantly, forced to remain incognito, cannot leave readers indifferent, because he āspends his life in many hotelsā, recalling his pre-war homeland, which he calls ālost paradiseā.
Commonality of the image of Ravik and the personality of its author
Remarque created the Arc de Triomphe, not only generously endowing the protagonist with autobiographical features. Like Dr. Ravik, he could not live in his native Germany (the Nazis revoked his citizenship). Like that, he fought in the First World War. As the protagonist of the novel, he was in love. However, the literary Joan Madu had a very real prototype - Marlene Dietrich, with whom Remarque had a vivid romance in 1937, which ended only in the death of the writer in 1970. It was
unhappy love, because Marlene was not created for family life ... The writerās talented presentation of the story of their love makes readers memorize Remarqueās quotes, enjoying their poetry and sublimity.
What else connected the great German novelist of the 20th century with Dr. Ravik? Hatred of the Nazis. According to the plot of the book, the surgeon kills the Gestapo executioner Haake in Paris, who tortured and tortured his beloved to suicide.
If you were caught by the creator of this hero, a front-line writer, a man guillotining his beloved elder sister Elfrid in Germany, perhaps this ill-conceived enemy would have been destroyed in real life in much the same way! The "selfish" initial sense of revenge in Ravik's mind, due to reflection, was replaced by the desire to "resume the struggle." This can be understood by reading Remarque's quotes about the war, about human dignity.
āArc de Triompheā - a deep, philosophical novel
What else brings the literary image and its creator closer together? The inner core, which allows not only to survive the times of the brown plague of fascism, but also to become ideological opponents of the hateful ideology. Remark does not express his attitude to fascism directly. For him, these are āprison cellsā, āthe frozen faces of tortured friends,ā āthe petrified grief of the living.ā But it is clearly visible through the phrases of his characters: sometimes revealing, sometimes cynical. Like an artist - in separate strokes - he conveys to the reader the rethought essence of the ābrown plagueā.
Remark on the role of books in life
No one before or after wrote about books so penetratingly. After all, for a rogue man, an emigrant man, they, these ācubic pieces of a steaming conscienceā, were often their only closest friends. Both Remarque and Dr. Ravik created by him, being far from their homeland, find an outlet for the soul in reading books. How accurate are Remarque's quotes about them, true friends and advisers for the suffering human souls, the intangible generation of human genius!
He was fond of the works of Zweig, Dostoevsky, Goethe, Thomas Mann. Clear business, books on philosophy and sound classical literature do not bring additional material means for existence. However, as the German classic of the 20th century insistently writes, they create an insurmountable barrier to evil in the soul of a person, preventing this dark element from entering his life.
The image of the author in the "Arc de Triomphe"
Remark quotes speak of the authorās life position. "The Arc de Triomphe ... protecting the grave of the Unknown Soldier with its bulk", acts as a pan-European symbol of peace and stability. It is perceived as a kind of majestic artifact that survived the rise and collapse of Napoleon and which is destined to survive the fiasco of Hitler. The novel itself is a hymn to the European worldview based on love, universal values: rational individualism, tolerance, a critical understanding of reality, readiness for dialogue.
Despite the fact that Dr. Ravik, living in Paris on fake documents, undergoes deprivation - does not have permanent housing, does not have a family and children - he is not embittered, his thoughts and actions are honest and open. He, following his conscience, assists people in situations where his more prosperous colleagues show self-interest and selfishness.
High decency in private life has always been noted by Remark himself. He, like Mother Teresa, tried to help everyone. For example, Erich simply sheltered Hans Sohacheverās colleague in his home ... His works were in demand and brought fees, he actually spent all of them on financial assistance to his compatriots - dissidents.
The loss of his friend, the German journalist Felix Mendelssohn, who was killed in public in broad daylight by Nazi agents, became a serious personal loss for the writer.
He is sick of his compatriots, especially those who are in France. Indeed, the occupation of this country by Germany for many of them ended with a concentration camp and death ... Perhaps that is why Remark finishes his most tragic novel on a minor note. The conflicting and feminine Joan dies from the shot of a jealous actor. German troops cross the border and approach the capital of France. Ravik acts like a fatalist - surrenders to the police, instead of hiding ...
Submitted by the author of the special atmosphere of Paris of the 30s
It would be unfair, talking about the "Arc de Triomphe", not to note its artistic and historical value. Reading it, as if you are plunging into a pre-war atmosphere ... A special image of Paris, living an unnatural luxurious life, as if by inertia, is narrated by Remarque's quotes. The Arc de Triomphe talks about the carelessness of life in French society. The fragility of this state of affairs is obvious.
Symbolic in the description of the French capital is the focus of readers on two buildings - the Arc de Triomphe and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
Conclusion
The readership is many-sided ... We are really different: poor and rich, successful and struggling for existence, seeing the world in bright colors and painting it in gray tones. So what do we have in common?
I would like that, having asked this question, the readers themselves would find the answer in classical literature, recalling some quotes ... Erich Remarck, being in essence an individualist, in fact in all his novels appealed specifically to the human community. And its main values, according to the writer, should be love, friendship, loyalty, decency. A person with these qualities invariably brings light to that small world where he lives.
However, this is not enough. Indeed, the āpassportā (ie citizenship), according to Remarque, gives a person only one right - to starve to death, āwithout being on the runā. Therefore, it is also important to be a professional in the chosen business.
All these qualities are inherent in the literary heroes of Remarque.