Support the following statement: The poster of the young girl makes Paul want to be young and happy again, but his encounter with the young brunette shows that Paul will never be young and happy again.

Paul feels dirty and broken when he sees the picture. When he meets the brunette, Paul feels he has seen far too much to feel young. They are virgins with rifles experienced in the horrors of war but inexperienced in the staples of a young man.

Instead of admiring the girl and spending time thinking about how he wishes he had a girl like that, he blurts out that her shoes aren't suitable for marching in. The war has infested his mind, and it is all he can think about. It has stolen his boyish innocence from him. Also, when he is with the brunnette, he mentions that he lost his virginity in a brothel. Instead of a young 19 or 20 year old boy saving his virginity for a woman he really loved, he lost it to a prostitute. Every time he has sex with a girl, he will remember his first time was with a prostitute. The war has even taken away his satisfaction and joy from all women.