Erich Maria Remarque - a writer who was both hated and adored by all of Germany

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

Erich Maria Remarque know as the writer of the "lost generation". He was one of those who first portrayed the horrors of war, which shocked the then public. But the fate of the writer developed in such a way that it was just right to write a novel based on his biography.

The future writer was born into the family of a bookbinder, so from early childhood he had access to any works. When the boy grew up, he began to dream of a teacher's career, but 1916 made its own adjustments: Remarque became a soldier. In 1917 he was seriously wounded and remained in the hospital until the end of the war. In 1918, the writer learned about the death of his mother and in memory of her changed his middle name Paul to Maria.

After the end of the First World War, Remarque tries to return to normal life, working as a teacher, then as a seller of tombstones, then as a magazine editor. Later, his literary heroes will get the characters of real people with whom the writer had a chance to encounter. Remarque's first wife Ilsa Jutta Zambona became the prototype for Pat, the lover of the protagonist from the novel Three Comrades.

The real relationship between Erich Maria and his wife was uneasy. After four years of marriage, a divorce followed, then marriage again (the only way Ilsa could leave Germany), and again a divorce.

The novel All Quiet on the Western Front brought worldwide recognition to Remarque. The author wrote it literally in one breath - in just 6 weeks. In Germany alone, in one year (1929), the book sold 1.5 million copies. The novel described all the horrors and brutality of the war through the eyes of a 20-year-old soldier. In 1933, the Nazis who came to power decided that a representative of the German race could not have a decadent mood, they declared Remarque a "traitor to the motherland," deprived of German citizenship and staged a demonstrative burning of his book.

A real persecution began on Erich Maria Remarque. The Nazis declared him to be a descendant of French Jews. As if he deliberately changed the name "Kramer" and wrote it the other way around - "Remarque". And the author of all changed the spelling of his surname in the French manner (Remarque). The writer left Germany in a hurry and settled in Switzerland. For this, the Nazis took revenge on his sister. In 1943, Elvira Scholz was detained for anti-Hitler statements. At the trial, the woman was mocked: "Your brother, unfortunately, hid from us, but you cannot leave." Remarque's sister was executed by guillotine.

While in Switzerland, Erich Maria Remarque met Marlene Dietrich. It was a passionate but painful romance at the same time. The windy beauty, then moved away, then brought the writer closer to her. In 1939, they left for Hollywood together.

In America, Erich Maria Remarque continues to create new works, film studios are filming five of his novels. It would seem, what else is needed for happiness … but the writer becomes depressed. From this state he was brought out by a new love - Paulette Godard. Remarque called her salvation. Oddly enough, but the three main women in his life were of the same type: big eyes, chiseled figures, soulful eyes.

In 1967, the German ambassador to Switzerland solemnly presented the Order of the Federal Republic of Germany to Remark. But the irony is that after the awarding of the awards, the German citizenship was never returned to the writer. Erich Maria Remarque died on September 25, 1970 at the age of 72. Marlene Dietrich sent flowers to the writer's funeral, but Paulette Godard did not accept them, remembering that how painful was Remarque's romance with Marlene Dietrich.