The Forgotten Soldier

In addition to being a story of a soldier at war, The Forgotten Soldier is also the story of a boy becoming a man. Sajer is not even 16 when he joins the army as a means of escaping a forced labor battalion. The early parts of the book are divided between rueful reflections on the innocence of youth and the stark recognition that he is on a journey that will bury that innocence once and for all. He starts off idealistic, eager to put aside the monotony of auxiliary duty and see real action on the front. Upon his first brush with combat, he is nervous and hesitant, and is shocked when, after his first brush with battle, he witnesses the cold-blooded execution of enemy prisoners.

Sajer’s years in the army are not without more conventional markers of growing up. He has his first love. He learns to enjoy stereotypically military privileges like cigarettes and alcohol, which initially disgusted him. However, even these conventional aspects of coming of age are colored by war. He meets Paula while he is on leave, and afterward he loses touch with her in the chaos of post-war Europe. He develops a taste for alcohol and cigarettes because they provide a rare moment of joy and bonding amid boundless privation and suffering on the front.