The Road Back Summary
Erich Maria Remarque

The Road Back Summary

The Road Back extends the "rites of passage" theme of All Quiet on the Western Front; this becomes evident as the novel opens with a "Prologue" that begins with "What is still left of Number 2 Platoon." Once Armistice is declared, the survivors recall their dead comrades who include Baumer, Kat, Haie, Brandt, and Muller. In addition, the narrator is nineteen-year-old Ernst Birkholz who is similar to Baumer in thought and temperament and who relates his and his friends' feelings and experiences after the Armistice as they return home from the hell of war.

Moreover, whereas Baumer explains the effects of war on him and his comrades, Birkholz explains the aftereffects of war on him and his friends. Birkholz for example, feels isolated from his immediate family — his mother, as did Baumer's, fails to understand that war has changed her boy into a man. At home Birkholz is...

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