Mary Ellen's Reviews > All Quiet on the Western Front

This classic has not lost its power since I last read it 25 years ago. Back then, I was a young history teacher trying to impress on my students the horror and waste of war, and I appreciated it for its harrowing depiction of life in the trenches, of the many lives lost in the effort to retain control over mere inches or feet of territory. This time, I was also impressed by the quality of the writing, of the times when truly poetic images intrude on Baumer's increasingly weary narrative. A quick read, and a valuable one. (I note that Nicholas Kristof included it in his counterintuitive "Top 10 Beach Reads" column in the 7/10/11 NY Times!) NOTE: the gap between "start" and "finish" is no reflection on the quality of the book... I had to set it aside for a few deadlines.