Examples Of Henry In The Red Badge Of Courage

In, The Red Badge of Courage a novel by Stephen Crane, the idea that courage is an aspect that must be learned and tested upon is displayed through the character of Henry, a young soldier fighting in the American Civil War. Henry displays this relationship with courage throughout the novel in three major ways. At the beginning of the Novel, Henry misconceives courage and believes he has it until after the first battle. The second is in how he begins to realize his misconception and struggles with the real version of courage. Finally, Crane demonstrates Henry's relationship with courage by the mastering and developing of Henry's own courage.

Courage is something that is sought after by most people. It is an aspect associated with true manhood.

The ancient Greeks and Romans created mythological heroes such as Hercules and Achilles to epitomize this characteristic. Soldiers in WWI and WWII were considered couraages because of their sacrifice of their own wants and needs to serve their country. Webster's defines courage as being strength in the face of pain or grief or the ability to do something that frightens one. What this means is that courage is not necessarily something restricted only to the physically strong, but it is actually an aspect that must be made by the mentally strong to go against one's fears and face them. Courage comes from the Middle English meaning (denoting the heart, as the seat of feelings): from Old French corage, and from Latin cor‘heart.’ The origin of courage further argues the fact that courage is based upon feelings and getting it requires a mental choice. Like all feelings, courage can fade, which brings up the idea that courage is an aspect that must be learned and tested upon. One of the best ways to show this almost roller coaster emotion is to show it through a soldier in war. Stephen Crane displays courage throughout the Novel, The Red Badge of Courage, in each and every soldier fighting but he focuses on one soldier in particular, and what better way is there to display the perception of courage than through the eyes of a young boy on the cusp of manhood. In this case, that soldier is Henry, a young soldier fighting in the American Civil War.
At the beginning of the novel Henry has no real sense of what true courage is. His only sense of what true courage is comes from stereotypical stories told by townspeople who believe that war is glorious. “Henry had enlisted and fled his home and because of these vainglorious desires set in the impossibly romantic picture of war which his imagination has evoked from village gossip” (LaFrance 167). Henry, despite his mother’s protests, joins the war early in hopes of glory, with a the seed of a false meaning of courage firmly planted into his mind. This seed begins to grow even more when Henry enters the camp. There he sees the loud soldiers boasting and trying to flex their bravery, even though not one of them has been in a battle yet. Henry later begins to actually believe he has courage when the fighting starts. He joins the ranks and begins firing upon the enemy. One would assume that this is an open display of this courage, however his actions are not true demonstrations of what courage is. “...he seems to have no conscious awareness of what he is about (referring to courageously fighting). Thus his courage seems rather meaningless” (Gibson 157). Gibson is arguing that any person can become a part of something courageous without actually being courageous themselves because they did not make the conscious decision to go against their own fear. In this case, Henry has numbed his mind to become apart of the group fighting and has not grown in the psychological sense. Since Henry has no true idea what courage is, he concludes after this battle that he indeed has it and that war is glorious. This feeling he has almost creates a “calm before the storm” scenario. Crane brutally wakes Henry up to the fact of this misconception in numerous ways but the first sign of this rude awakening comes in the brutal death of a soldier named Conklin. If Henry was truly courageous the soldiers death would cause Henry to mourn, however this death has a very different effect on Henry. “Conklin received his wound in the side for dramatic necessity: he has to die slowly…to make his death so grotesque it will particularly horrify Henry.” (LaFrance 165) Henry being horrified is another way of saying that he is shocked in the manner Conklin died. He is horrified of the idea of this brutal death for no good reason in his mind.
Crane’s novel itself also offers a number of examples that concur with the idea that Henry conceives an incorrect concept of what courage is and the first battle viciously delivers a wakeup call to Henry.

As all young people do when they reach their teenage years, they slowly start to develop their identity. One of the ways they do this is asking questions and making observations. This is why Crane chose Henry to be a young boy in the middle of his growing years. Before Henry has even enlisted into the Army one of the things he has done many times is dream about war. Anyone who knows about war knows that it is hell. Men are turned into savages and taken away from there families to die prematurely. Men who normally would not hurt a fly are forced to kill or be killed. Henry has not been taught this though, “...there seemed to be much glory in them..His mind had drawn for him large pictures extravagant in color”(Crane 4). Henry’s town is the exception for the general mindset that war is hell. Henry has daydreamed about war for such a long time he can only see beautiful pictures of glory and not bloodstained fields of death. Crane enters this insight into Henry's mind for the reader as a premonition of things to come. As the battle approaches Henry’s mind enters almost into a frenzy of questions. Many of these questions are centered around the idea of whether or not he will be able to take advantage of the war to become courageous. He builds up enough confidence to finally ask

one of the soldiers a question regarding this and almost immediately regrets it, “ ‘How do you know you won’t run when the time comes?’ Asked the youth. ‘Run?’ Said the loud one; ‘Run?—of course not!’ He laughed”(Crane 14) This is one of the first real-life examples of what Henry believes to be true courage, he regrets asking this question because of the soldiers such denial of even the idea of running. However later in the novel, Crane reveals this loud macho-man persona means little if it cannot be backed by action.
There is a saying that goes, “Ignorance is bliss” in other words the less a person knows, the happier they will be.

In the case of this novel, this saying is brutally truthful. Henry is ignorant to the fact that the courage he has is not true and is blissful up unto the point that Crane has him encounter Conklin's death. Once this occurs, he begins to realize his misconception and his real struggle begins. This realization actually begins to occur even before Henry’s encounter with the dying soldier. In fact, literary critic Paul Sorrentino, in the Student companion to Stephen Crane, argues that “Frustrated by the boredom of waiting for combat, he begins doubting his own view of war.” (63) If this is true then the death of Conklin simply pushed Henry over the edge that he already began to walk towards mentally. After the soldiers death, Henry is almost tormented mentally with thoughts of himself, others, and the war itself. Sorrentino again notes this internal battle again in the Student companion to Stephen Crane “Henry’s mind… records his shifts between optimism and despair, self-glorifications and self-denunciation as well as romanticized views of self and depictions of warfare.” (65) Henry wants to still believe that war is what he grew up to envision it to be nonetheless, he cannot unsee the severe images unfolding before him and he realizes that courage is more difficult than he could have imagined. Though this torment may seem in vain, throughout the novel, this

struggle Henry deals with actually helps him to shape who he wants to become as a man. “... the ending of the novel is to point out the psychological progression that can be traced...this rememberance does make him ashamed of his own weakness and the result is a new understanding of himself.” (LaFrance 166) Through this internal battle, LaFrance claims that Stephen Crane is able to evolve Henry’s character to both understand himself and fix his weaknesses.
Contradictory to the Veteran-like writing the novel displays, Stephen Crane never actually fought in a war. This is astonishing due to how well Crane is able to paint a picture of the terror that becomes Henry when he realizes that the enemy will soon overrun his platoon. “He yelled with fright and swung about...he was like a proverbial chicken… he began to speed toward the rear in great leaps” (Crane 28). Henry runs flippantly and without shame even though just hours before he was pondering the question about whether or not he would run. Upon being faced by the enemy in great number, he is overcome by fear and runs, runs like a coward. This situation presents a direct contradiction to Henry’s supposed courageous actions in the previous battle when unbeknownst to him those actions were actually meaningless due to their lack of Henry’s direct choosing. This stage of the novel displays the inner struggle and failure of Henry while dealing with the real version of what true courage is. In this case Henry ignores any voice inside him to not run and he turns his back on the battle with only his own health in mind. This event only deals with the struggle Henry has with becoming courageous. He receives a forewarning that his idea of courage comes right before the start of the first battle. “ He turned and beheld the loud soldier, ‘It’s my first and last battle, old boy’... He ended in a quavering sob of pity for himself…” (Crane 20) The same man Henry felt shame for asking if he would run is now no better than a toddler crying for his mother. This man indirectly helped Henry to believe that a loud macho-man