Arch of Triumph

I say nothing, I suppose, when I say this novel is sad, profound and beautiful. All Remarque’s works are that. However I can only emphasize all those elements are “in Extremis” with this novel. His most powerful and believable love story lies in these pages .. but once again there is no HEA, there never is a Happy Ever After with Remarque.I struggled with tears at the end. A love that should have grown and thrived does not. Meanwhile there will not be a second Munich either, a second and lasting “peace in our time”; the Maginot Line will not hold back the German tanks; the refugees and Jews and Romani and handicapped and leftists and those who resist the swastika will not all survive almost 6 years of total war.The human race repeats inhumanity to man and woman and child and beast again and again and it repeats it in the 21st century and it will repeat it in the 22nd as well after we are all gone. We have a sickness. A recurring sickness of war and hate and power and destruction. Sometimes the better angels of our nature prevail. But never for long and never without sacrifice.Heartbreaking. Yet certainly one of his best. It is epic and deep.

Although Arch of Triumph is the title of the novel, the Arch itself does not have much to do with the plot, other than the story was set in 1938-39 in Paris, just before the start of the Second World War. The central character was a Jewish German doctor named Ravic, who was tortured in a German concentration camp. He escaped to France and lived in Paris as a refugee. He was an excellent surgeon but, being a refugee, he could not practice legally. He managed to work with two French surgeons with lesser skills to perform major surgeries illegally. His work enhanced the French doctors’ reputations, who also pocketed the lion shares of the fees.Ravic met the heroine Joan in a rainy evening in the streets of Paris. Joan’s lover had died suddenly in their hotel room, and she was roaming aimlessly when Ravi ran into her. She did not know anybody in Paris and had no home to return to. Ravic helped her settle during this difficult period, including finding her a singing job through his friend Boris. The story went on with the development of their relationship and their falling in love with each other. All went well for more than a year, during which they even spent a week in the French Riviera. Then, one day, on a Paris street, Ravic saved a worker’s life who had fell from a construction site. Under questioning as a witness by the police, his illegal refugee status was revealed, and he was deported to Switzerland.As he had done before, Ravic was able to cross the border again and return to Paris. Although he and Joan were united, their lives were not the same as before. Joan thought Ravic would not return, and had met other men in the meantime, including someone who was an actor, who introduced her to the acting profession. There were frequent quarrels between Ravic and Joan. Toward the end of the story, Joan died from a gunshot wound by the actor. About this time, war was declared between Germany and France. Ravic, together with the refugees living in Hotel International, were rounded up by the French police. The lights of Paris were turned off in anticipation of air raids. They were on the way to a French concentration camp. When the car carrying the refugees turned into the Place De l’Etoile, “It was so dark that one could not even see the Arc de Triomphe”, so ended the 535 page novel.Unlike “All Quiet on the Western Front” or “A Time to Love and a Time to Die”, there were no brutal war scenes in this book. There were, however, graphic descriptions of several surgeries, including a cancer surgery, an abortion surgery, and the amputation of a leg. There was also a description of death on the operating table due to the patient arriving a little too late, as well as the gruesome narrative of Ravic killing his Gestapo torturer Haake. When he found Haake in Paris, he lured him to ride with him to the outskirts, where he killed and buried him.In all of Remarque’s novels, there were ample pages devoted to the descriptions of natural sceneries and thoughts associated with various human emotions. The latter rivals Freud. To many readers, these were mesmerizing passages. To others, they were probably somewhat long winded.Another characteristic of Remarque’s novels was that, whenever people met, the first thing they did was to have a drink, whether in a bar or just in a room. Drinks are indispensable for novelists. Most of the names of the brands, such as vodka and cognac, are familiar. One new brand I learned in this novel was calvados, a favorite drink in France.All of Remarque’s books contain some memorable quotes. This one is no exception. Here they are:- Faith can easily make one fanatical. That’s why all religions have cost so much blood. Tolerance is the daughter of doubt.- An avalanche couldn’t be stopped once it had started to move; whoever tried, fell beneath it. Better to wait and later to dig out the victims.- Man is great in his intentions, but weak in carrying them out. Therein lie our misery and our charm.- We have our dreams because without them we could not bear the truth.- Happiness lies all around us. We only have to pick it up.In conclusion, a novel replete with ups and downs of romantic love, psychoanalysis of human emotions, and vivid descriptions of natural sceneries.

Excellent.

What can I say about this book? It is everything that is about the human condition, yet it is nothing. It is the cosmos in a single glance, yet is as insignificant as the leg of a centipede crawling through the human refuse of a thousand different centuries of struggle and despair. As I read it the words swept over me as the fog covers the sins of all mortals with a veil of beauty and indifference. Oh what a scent! I can still recall its initial fragrance! And, yet I recall nothing at all. My life has no meaning and yet it means the universe.Had enough? That's what I got out of this book. Three quarters, without exaggeration, dealt with a love affair that contained dialogue and thought monologues such as this. Was it pure gibberish, or did it have great meaning. The protagonist is a doctor named Ravic, a German refugee in Paris, after escaping the Nazis and a terrible ordeal of torture. He meets a woman named Joan and the first three quarters of the book seems to deal with this love affair. The philosophizing went on and on. Through most of the book I was lost. Not in the action, but in the inaction and endless philosophizing. Finally, the last quarter of the book dealt with Nazis, the imminent war and the plight of the immigrants. If the book had been more like the last quarter of it, I would have appreciated it more. As it is, I just didn't get it. It is either a brilliant masterpiece that was beyond me, or wildly overwritten. Sorry, that's all.

He was so optimistic in such a strange way. He wrote about life and death realistically. He was chased by Hitler, all his books were burned by the Nazis, yet he kept his head above water at all times.This book is about a German man on the run from Nazis due to political views. He is abroad for quite a while when his beloved wife in Germany gets very sick. He makes a decision that will affect the rest of his life.

Herr Remarque may be among the greatest of authors.The setting is Paris in 1939. It seems that every page has the imminent invasion of France hanging above the characters and their dialogue. It is written (and translated) with utterly beautiful prose and images. I do not feel the need to recount the story line here. Suffice it to say that the protagonist is a surgeon who, being a deportee from Germany, is prohibited from practicing in France and must therefore function subordinate to much lesser practitioners. Prior to his deportation he was tortured in Germany. Despite his situation he is a compassionate and caring person. I know of few authors who could capture this entire milieu nearly so well.

Love between a man and a woman whose lives are compromised in different ways. A well-told tale with observations of depth and quality throughout, it also offers a portrait of Paris as it was just before September 1939.

Must read

A must read if you are a medical practitioner.

Love Revenge living day to day. Enduring more than you believe you can. All of it on edge of the Second World War in Paris. Refugees trying just to live but really just existing because they have lost so much.

Maybe i had too big expectations based on the great reputation of this book but for me it was a bit too slow and too little happening. Well written though and great print.