Chap 6 Characters

An attack is coming and everyone knows it, the men return to the frontlines, passing a bombed schoolhouse. There they see brand new coffins stacked across the schoolhouse. Paul knows that one of those coffins has his name on it. Especially when you're in the front lines of warfare. Paul says, " The Front is a cage in which we must await fearfully whatever may happen. We lie under the network of arching shells and live in suspense of uncertainty. Over us Chance hovers" (6.10). While they see in the trenches Kat tells everyone that the English has better guns then the French. Even more he sees rats steal his food from him. Paul is dancing with death by staying alive through this gruesome battle. He feels the way the earth seems to be tearing away under his feet and his having lost feeling on many levels. He cannot fathom the bodies that lay die and unburied. He lost the track of time, and becomes very furious about the pointless battle were men are dying every day over nothing. Coming into the battle their was 150 men when Paul return to base their only 32 men.






As the 2nd Company walks by the coffins that are inevitably intended for them, Kat becomes dispirited. He has had a great sense for what is happening on the front lines and begins to realize that the war is being lost. To make things worse, rations become very thin and Kat fails to find any food. As the constant shelling begins to break the new recruits, Kat helps Paul restrain the recruits. However, eventually a recruit escapes the trench and is nailed by a enemy shell. Kat and Paul try to keep busy with a card game but nobody can keep their minds off the constant shelling.


Tjaden is the only man who keeps calm and unsuspicious while the other soldiers are getting nervous about the lull in the fighting.


Corporal Himmelstoss is found by Paul in a trench cowering and pretending to be injured. Himmelstoss realized how terrible the war really is and he tries to avoid the fighting. In a moment of redemption, Himmelstoss is recruited to do a line charge and ends up bringing the badly injured Haie Westhus back to the trenches. In a more mature mindset, Himmelstoss tries to make amends with his former trainees by scavenging them some food.