We have lost all sense of other considerations, because they are artificial. Only the facts are real and important to us. And good boots are hard to come by." - All Quiet On The Western Front, Ch. 2
Erich Maria RemarqueBut now, for the first time, I see you are a man like me. I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late. Why do they never tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are just as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, and the same dying and the same agony - forgive me, comrade; how could you be my enemy?
Erich Maria RemarqueFor us lads of eighteen they ought to have been mediators and guides to the world of maturity, the world of work, of duty, of culture, of progress -- to the future.
Erich Maria Remarque(Ravic speaking of a butterfly caught in the Louvre) In the morning it would search for flowers and life and the light honey of blossoms and would not find them and later it would fall asleep on millennial marble, weakened by then, until the grip of the delicate, tenacious feet loosened and it fell, a thin leaf of premature autumn.
Erich Maria Remarque