Kemmerich’s death extends the criticism of romantic illusions about
the war. He dies from a relatively light wound that probably became
infected—there is no glory in his death. Here Kantorek’s patriotic
exhortations fail. In modern warfare, there is no room for refined
notions of honor, nor for sentimentality. Müller needs Kemmerich’s
boots; it is not that he or any of the other survivors are not affected
by their friend’s death but rather that they cannot allow themselves
to dwell on their grief. In this way, the boots become one of the
novel’s most important symbols of the cheapness of life: the boots
repeatedly outlive their owners, and each time the man wearing them
dies, the question of who will inherit the boots overshadows the
death. Life on the front is dangerous, ugly, dirty, and miserable;
the soldiers do not have adequate food and clothing, and so the
day-to-day matters of survival take precedence over sentimentality.
The men cannot afford to act otherwise; dwelling on each friend’s
death would lead to madness.
