"I should wish to know where in the whole world you could find another father like my father?" The last line of Isaac Babel's short story "Crossing into Poland," turns the mood of the plot from another war story to a melancholic perception of the bloody horrors of the consequences of war. , A story that greatly shows the changing of one man's thoughts, and reality.

The story's first person point of view ads even more of a personal touch to the story. In the opening paragraph the narrator describes the surroundings in great detail saying, "Fields flowered around us, crimson with poppies; a noon-tide breeze played in the yellowing rye; on the horizon virginal buckwheat rose like the wall of a distant monastery. The Volyn's peaceful stream moved away from us in sinuous curves and was lost in the pearly haze of the birch groves; crawling between flowery slopes, it wound weary arms through a wilderness of hops." In my mind the picture of the flowered fields with a grand monastery in the back is drawn to a perfect replica of the words. The mood however, transforms from describing the nice aspects of battle into a grotesque reality. When th

t over, their lives will be changed.

I see it as with his dream and the image of the dead man next to him, it as if almost that he seems guilty for what he has done, for yelling at the family as soon as he entered the house. And with the dream it seems that he has maybe seen a brutal past and cannot deal with the war anymore.

Soon after the soldier is awoken by the woman whose house he is in saying, "you're calling out in your sleep and you're tossing to and fro. I'll make you a bed in another corner, for you're pushing my father about." Soon after the soldier looks to his right to see her father whose throat has been torn out and his face cut in two. The woman goes on to tell of how her father begged not to be killed in front of his daughter, for she did not deserve to see it. And then she says to him, "I should wish to know where in the whole world you could find another father like my father?" This line changes the whole story in my eyes. It goes from just another war retelling into an atrocious reality. Almost like a history lesson that the soldiers brutally murdered their enemies. The narrator also seems to be shaken from this sight, as he looks to the right and is startled to the sight. I think the narrator is trying to forget about the war, with looking the other way it is almost a!

just seemed to fly out at me, as in a history class. The stories of how soldiers would go into the houses and just basically obliterate the house and the family, but to see this soldier actually stay in there with the family and not bring harm to them are quite intriguing.

"Crossing into Poland" as I see it

Some common words found in the essay are:
Crossing Poland, Bridage Commander's, Mother God, Jews Easter, War II, Brigade Commander, crossing poland, Isaac Babel's, VI Division, soon soldier, world father father, wish world father, war story, eyes falling, world father, father father, father father line, father line, wish world,
Approximate Word count = 1096
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)