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All Quiet on the Western
Front As I write this, it is very early in the morning, and I am watching the war on TV. The network is showing the same pictures and same footage in an increasingly predictable rotation. Shot of Rumsfeld talking, shot of American troops in the desert, shot of Myers talking, shot of a demolished Iraqi market. The sound is off. I thought about putting on some sort of music, because silence makes me nervous, but I decided the war needs no soundtrack. Earlier, a friend came to visit, glanced at the TV -- Rumsfeld was on -- and said, "I've seen this show before." I have read All Quiet on the Western Front twice now. I don't remember when I first picked it up. Maybe it was when I was 13, and Gulf War I was on TV, because I've seen this show before, too. It scares me that I've learned to think about war so abstractly. I suppose that's why I occasionally read books like this one. It doesn't make war any more real to me. But it fills me with panic and dread, and despite my better judgment, I've been seeking those things out. Feeling reassured makes me feel guilty. I can turn this war off with a remote control. That makes me feel guilty too. I read this book, again, a week ago, when the major networks still thought that war coverage was more important than Will and Grace. I've thought a great deal about what I could write, how I could respond, and have come up with nothing. It's probably enough to say that All Quiet on the Western Front is considered by many to be the greatest novel about war ever written. I believe that is probably the case. I've never read anything like it. It seems almost irrelevant to say that the novel takes place during World War I; it is, in fact, timeless. I guess that's an easy observation to make when you're watching a war -- the sequel to a war -- on television. So all I can say is that I have nothing to say. On the television: shot of the aftermath of a suicide bomber, shot of the parents of a dead U.S. soldier. They're wearing black, not red, white and blue. Now, a break for the local weather. I wonder who will write the first great book about Gulf War II. I wonder what time it is in Iraq. I'm tired and depressed, and I know that's irrelevant. I'll turn off the television soon, probably. And maybe forget about this war and this book for a few minutes. Until then, I'm still speechless. Shocked, awed, beyond belief.
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