All Quiet On The Moon Is Down Analysis

In both All Quiet on the Western Front and The Moon is Down, the soldiers deal with harmful effects from the strain of war and fighting. These effects are both psychological and physical. The Moon is Down places less emphasis on this because of the fact that it is a pro-war novel. All Quiet on the Western Front shows more examples of these effects, especially in its focus on the main character.
In All Quiet on the Western Front, most of the characters are easily shown to be effected by the war. On the battlefield, the soldiers never know what will happen next, especially when they are in the bunkers. These scenes on the battlefield become very gruesome with blood, gore, and other horrors. Young recruits are always dying, and the soldiers' friends often die in their presence. Even from the beginning of the book, the soldiers begin to stop caring about their friends' deaths, and they no longer take a moment to honor them. When Kemmerich is on his deathbed for example, the soldiers are worried about who will inherit his boots, rather than comforting him. These are only a few examples of the horrors throughout All Quiet on the Western Front which effect the soldiers of the war.
In The Moon is Down, the examples of the war on the soldiers are less evident.
Even further, they are less descriptive. There is no mention at all of bloodshed, except in a quotation of the prevention of such events. Rarely ever do the soldiers describe how they feel, and when they do, they are very brief. The only time description is seen is during Alex Morden's trial when the medical report states that the man's skull was crushed. This gives the reader a sense of the war having little to no impact on the
soldiers.

The Moon is Down is often analyzed as a pro-war novel. It is used as propaganda to support the patriotic act of fighting for your country. It shows that a country does not want to end up being invaded by their enemies. If the conditions of fighting during the war are so horrific, then it would discourage soldiers from doing so. For this reason, it does not describe the horrors of war which so greatly effect soldiers, such as in All Quiet on the Western Front. All Quiet on the Western Front is considered to be an anti-war novel which is clearly depicted through its gruesome examples of war's mental and physical stress on human beings. Soldiers are forever changed from their experiences in the war in both good and bad ways. These factors were used to convince readers that fighting in the war effort was more harmful than helpful.
The Moon is Down is non-descriptive in its examples of how the soldiers can be effected by war. It shows no reasons why the war should not be fought or supported. All Quiet on the Western Front gives a very vivid idea of how detrimental the war is on soldiers and the negative effects that come out of the war effort. Both of these have become popular war novels, but for their different takes on the war.