Fear, worry, anxiety, curiosity, distress, nervousness; all emotions of a young, naïve soldier entering war for the first time. To the reader, this is exactly what Henry Fleming represents. Because Crane never tells us what he looks like, just how old he is, or exactly where he comes from, and usually refers to him as “the youth” (Crane, 12) or “the young soldier” (Crane, 14), Henry could be any young many experiencing war for the first time. Throughout the novel The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming goes through many psychological chances, each having a distinct impact on the novel. These changes can be put into three stages; before, during, and after the war. Due to the ambiguity surrounding the character of Henry Fleming, the novel is not just a tale of Henry’s firsthand experiences, but a portrayal of the thoughts, feelings, fears, and development of any young soldier entering any war at any time.
Although Crane leaves much to the imagination when it comes to Henry Fleming, he does however reveal quite a bit about his early life. It becomes apparent that as a young boy, Henry grew up on a farm in New York (Crane, 17). Henry was raised by his loving mother after the tragic death of his father (Crane, 15). The occupants of the farm consist of Henry and his mother, who together tackle the necessary workload to maintain the farm and keep it in good condition (Crane, 17). The life Henry has led up to the point when he enters the draft, has been somewhat quiet, protected and sheltered (Crane, 11). This “wrapped in cotton wool” (Crane, 21) lifestyle could party contribute to Henry’s naïvely distorted views of war and later lead to his misfortune (Weisberger, 22).
Crane portrays Henry as a typical young American brought up in the nineteenth century (Weisberger, 22). He has been taught to associate manhood with courage, to dream of the glories of warfare, and to be instinctively patriotic (Breslin, 2). As a result, when the civil war breaks out, Henry volunteers to join the Union Army (Gibson, 61). Immediately, his mother disapproves of his decision, claiming that he would be much more useful on the farm (Crane, 23). At this point in the novel Henry is not mature enough to recognize the validity of his mothers statement (Gibson, 63). "Yer jest one little feller amongst a hull lot of others” (Cra...
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Delbanco, Andrew. The American Stephen Crane: The Context of The Red Badge of Courage. New Essays on The Red Badge of Courage. New York: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1986.
Gibson, Donald B. The Fiction of Stephen Crane. Southern Illinois University Press, 1968. 60-89
Hungerford, Harold. R. The Factual Framework of The Red Badge of Courage. American Literature (34: 4) January, 1963.
Mitchell, Lee Clark. New Essays on The Red Badge of Courage. New York: Cambridge U P, 1986
Weisberger, Bernard, "The Red Badge of Courage," in Twelve Original Essays on Great American Novels, edited by Charles Shapiro, Wayne State University Press, 1958, pp. 120-21. EXPLORING Novels. Online Edition. Gale, 2003. Reproduced in Student Resource Center. Detroit: Gale, 2004. http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/SRC.
Weiss, Daniel. Psychology and the Red Badge of Courage. Stephen Crane‘s The Red Badge of Courage. Bloom, Harold. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987.
The Red Badge of Courage and The Blue Hotel: The Singular Love of Stephen Crane
In The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming was drawn to enlist by his boyhood dreams. His highly romanticized notion of war was eclectic, borrowing from various classical and medieval sources. Nevertheless, his exalted, almost deified, conception of the life of a soldier at rest and in combat began to deflate before the even the ink had dried on his enlistment signature. Soon the army ceased to possess any personal characteristics Henry had once envisioned, becoming an unthinking, dispas...
Crane, Stephen. The Red Badge of Courage. United States of America, Chatham River Press, 1984. Print.
Henry is somewhat naïve, he dreams of glory, but doesn't think much of the duty that follows. Rather than a sense of patriotism, it is clear to the reader that Henry goals seem a little different, he wants praise and adulation. "On the way to Washington, the regiment was fed and caressed for station after station until the youth beloved
Events of crisis tend to reveal people’s true character, as well as help those people learn from the experience. Decisions people make during crises can display what kind of personality they have. In The Red Badge Of Courage by Stephen Crane, the youthful main protagonist, Henry, decides to join the army. In the beginning of the novel, Henry exhibits multiple cowardly qualities. However, through a series of battles, Henry learns more about himself and begins to become a remarkably brave soldier. Henry’s transformation from cowardice to bravery is portrayed through Henry’s change in thoughts, actions, and dialogue.
The Red Badge of Courage is not a war novel. It is a novel about life. This novel illustrates the trials and tribulations of everyday life. Stephen Crane uses the war as a comparison to everyday life. He is semi-saying that life is like a war. It is a struggle of warriors—the every day people—against the odds. In these battles of everyday life, people can change. In The Red Badge of Courage, the main character, Henry Fleming, undergoes a character change that shows how people must overcome their fears and the invisible barriers that hold them back from being the best people—warriors, in the sense that life is war—they can be. Henry has a character change that represents how all humans have general sense of fear of the unknown that must be overcome.
In the Historical fiction, “The Red Badge of Courage”, written by Stephen Crane; a young man try’s to find courage in himself in the time of war. After watching your commander die in war, would you stay and fight or return home and be a coward? Enlisting Himself into war Henry, to be more than the common man to prove worthyness and bravery. With the sergeant dead will Henry lead his men to victory, or withdraw his men in war. Not being the only are faced with the decision Jim and Wilson Henry’s platoons will have the same decision.
“The Red Badge of Courage” was written by Stephen Crane in 1985 as a fictional tale of a soldier of the Civil War. With its accurate depictions, readers were led to believe that Crane had at one time been a soldier. This was however not the case. Crane has a unique way of using themes and symbols in “The Red badge of Courage” to relay a very realistic portrayal of war.
War is not meant to be glorified. War is not meant to look easy. Stephen Crane was one of the few authors during his era who realized this fantasy-like aura around war and battles and decided to do something about it. The Red Badge of Courage, by Stephen Crane, was inspired by Crane’s life and his desire to portray the realistic side of war.
At the beginning, Henry Fleming has an undeveloped identity because his inexperience limits his understanding of heroism, manhood, and courage. For example, on the way to war, “The regiment was fed and caressed at station after station until the youth [Henry] had believed that he must be a hero” (Crane 13). Since he has yet to fight in war, Henry believes a hero is defined by what others think of him and not what he actually does. The most heroic thing he has done so far is enlist, but even that was with ulterior motives; he assumes fighting in the war will bring him glory, yet another object of others’ opinions. At this point, what he thinks of himself is much less important than how the public perceives him. As a result of not understanding
The success of combat is directly related to the morale of the soldiers, as it is the relationship with the neighboring soldier that demonstrates the motive for fighting. This association between men creates an abundance of compulsion from one man to the next. Similarly, as Henry Fleming developed a rapport with men throughout the 304th Regiment, he began to be subjected to the pressures of war and his companions, which greatly influenced his maturation during the Civil War. Having read of marches, sieges, conflicts, and the exploits of Greek warriors, and, as well, longing to see such, Henry enlisted into the Union army, against the wishes of his mother. Before his departure, Mrs. Fleming warned Henry, "...you must never do no shirking, child, on my account.
The Red Badge of Courage, by it’s very title, is infested with color imagery and color symbols. While Crane uses color to describe, he also allows it to stand for whole concepts. Gray, for example, describes both the literal image of a dead soldier and Henry Fleming’s vision of the sleeping soldiers as corpses and comes to stand for the idea of death. In the same way, red describes both the soldiers’ physical wounds and Henry’s mental vision of battle. In the process, it gains a symbolic meaning which Crane will put an icon like the ‘red badge of courage’. Stephen Crane uses color in his descriptions of the physical and the non-physical and allows color to take on meanings ranging from the literal to the figurative.
Bloom, Harold, ed. Modern Critical Interpretations: Stephan Crane's The Red Badge of Courage. New Yourk: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987.
If it was not for Stephen Crane and his visionary work than American Realism would not have taken hold of the United States during the eighteen hundreds. During the years following the Civil War America was a melting pot of many different writing styles. Many scholars argue that at this time there was still no definite American author or technique. Up to this point authors in the Americas simply copied techniques that were popular in regions of Europe. Stephen Crane came onto the scene with a very different approach to many of his contemporaries. He was a realist, and being such he described actions in a true, unadorned way that portrayed situations in the manner that they actually occurred (Kaplan). He had numerous admired pieces but his most famous work was the Red Badge of Courage (Bentley 103). In this novel he illustrates the accounts of a Union soldier named Henry Fleming. At first the writing was considered too graphic and many people did not buy the book. Eventually the American people changed their opinions and began to gravitate towards Crane’s work. The readers were fascinated by the realistic environment he creates even though he himself had never fought in a war (Bentley 103). By spreading the influence of realistic writing Crane has come to be known as the first American Realist.
113-117. Modern Critical Interpretations: Stephan Crane's The Red Badge of Courage. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987. Cody, Edwin H. Stephen Crane. Revised Edition.