A comparative review of war literature and anti-war literature with reference to Stahlgewittern by Ernst Junger and the anti-war novel Im Westen nichts Neues by Erich Maria Remarque.

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 Department of German Language and Literature, University of Tehran

2 University of Tehran

Abstract

Introduction
Although after World War I the concepts of "war literature" and "anti-war literature" have a special place in German literature and, still in some sources, any literary work with the subject of war, is considered as war literature, whether the author's view of the phenomenon of war is positive or negative. Although the concept of "war literature" for all war-related works does not impair the nature of these works: the different attitudes of war literature towards the phenomenon of war and the different goals pursued in these works reflect the fact that the concept of "war literature" should not be applied for all war-related works. The following article aims to extract the characteristics of these concepts by examination and confrontation of two works In Stahlgewittern by Ernst Jünger as a symbol of war literature and Im Westen nichts Neues by Erich Maria Remarque as an anti-war literature symbol. The article tries to extract the characteristics of these concepts from these works and shows that different literary works in the field of war should only be evaluated in close connection with the attitude of its authors.
Background of study
Among the works done in this case, it should be mentioned an article entitled "The inside of the novel is not news in the West" which was presented by Abdullah Hassanzadeh Mir Ali, Farzaneh Darwish and Sara Wazirzadeh in the second international conference on social, cultural and religious studies in 2017. Citing this work, the less visible layers of war have been taken into consideration. Another noteworthy article is "Comparison of anti-war literature in the works of Erich Maria Remak and Wolfgang Borschert" written by Parviz Azari Motamedi and Nasrin Zahirifard, which was published in 2012 in the journal of literary criticism studies, in which Remarque and Borschert's views on war are examined. 

Methodology
The method used to achieve the goals of this research is the descriptive method. With this method, the authors do not seek to examine the concepts of "war literature" and "anti-war literature" on the basis of specific theoretical foundations, but the goal is to understand Ernst Junger's attitude and thinking. The method aimed to study how Erich Maria Remarque has understood the phenomenon of war from two works based upon the comparative analysis of these works. We will analyze the results as the basis for the necessity of separating "war literature" and " "Anti-war literature" in relation to literary works related to war.
Conclusion
The following essay aims to compare the war diary in Storm of Steel by Ernst Junger and the anti-war novel by Erich Maria Remarque, not only to infer the characteristics of "war literature" and "anti-war literature" from these works, but also for the sake of showing the concept of "war literature" for every literary work. For this purpose the works related to the field of war should be evaluated and classified based on the thinking and attitude of their authors. If this aspect prevails, the works in which the phenomenon of war plays a positive role in the political, social, intellectual and spiritual development of the author should be referred to as war literature (or at least war literature in a special sense) and the works that describe the pains and sufferings of the people involved in the war, will be called anti-war literature. Even though the choice of the concept of "war literature" for all works related to war does not harm the nature of these works, however, the establishment of such concepts as anti-war literature in German literature and sacred defense literature in Persian literature requires a more serious attitude towards the evaluation of these works.

Keywords


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