The Red Badge of Courage An Episode of the American Civil War
()
About this ebook
Although Crane was born after the war, and had not at the time experienced battle first-hand, the novel is known for its realism and naturalism.
He began writing what would become his second novel in 1894, using various contemporary and written accounts (such as those published previously by Century Magazine) as inspiration. It is believed that he based the fictional battle on that of Chancellorsville; he may also have interviewed veterans of the 124th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiment, commonly known as the Orange Blossoms. Initially shortened and serialized in newspapers in December 1894, the novel was published in full in October 1895. A longer version of the work, based on Crane's original manuscript, was published in 1982.
The novel is known for its distinctive style, which includes realistic battle sequences as well as the repeated use of color imagery, and ironic tone. Separating itself from a traditional war narrative, Crane's story reflects the inner experience of its protagonist (a soldier fleeing from combat) rather than the external world around him.
Also notable for its use of what Crane called a "psychological portrayal of fear", the novel's allegorical and symbolic qualities are often debated by critics. Several of the themes that the story explores are maturation, heroism, cowardice, and the indifference of nature.
Stephen Crane
Stephen Crane was born in Newark, New Jersey, in 1871. He died in Germany on June 5, 1900.
Related to The Red Badge of Courage An Episode of the American Civil War
Related ebooks
The Red Badge of Courage Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage An Episode of the American Civil War Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage (Dream Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage - Unabridged Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage. Illustrated Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage (Centaur Classics) [The 100 greatest novels of all time - #57] Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsClassic Starts™: The Red Badge of Courage (Classic Starts™ Series) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge Of Courage (Golden Deer Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage: Classic Literature Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane - A Gripping Tale of Courage, Fear, and the Human Experience in the Face of War Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage ( A to Z Classics ) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage (Best Navigation, Active TOC) (A to Z Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage (Diversion Classics) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Works of Stephen Crane: Novels, Novellas, Short Stories & Poetry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsStephen Crane: Collected Works: Over 200 Novels, Short Stories & Poems Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage, The Open Boat and Other Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage (Warbler Classics Annotated Edition) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Complete Works: Novels, Novellas, Short Stories & Poetry Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRed Badge Of Courage: “It was not well to drive men into final corners; at those moments they could all develop teeth and claws.” Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Red Badge of Courage and Other Stories Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsEssential Novelists - Stephen Crane: naturalism and impressionism Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNorth vs. South Collection: 40+ Civil War Novels, Stories & History Books in One Volume Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNorth & South (Civil War Boxed Set): 40+ Novels, Stories & History Books in One Volume Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNorth vs. South: 40+ Civil War Novels, Stories & History Books Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
War & Military Fiction For You
The Book of Lost Names Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Forest of Vanishing Stars: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Farewell to Arms Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Grapes of Wrath Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Things They Carried Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5For Whom the Bell Tolls: The Hemingway Library Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All Quiet on the Western Front Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Last Kingdom Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The End of the Affair Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5In the Lake of the Woods: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Paris Daughter Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Visitors Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Going Postal Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Diamond Eye: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5All Quiet on the Western Front Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Johnny Got His Gun Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Cold Mountain: A Novel Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Winemaker's Wife Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mash: A Novel About Three Army Doctors Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tree of Smoke: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Three Fates Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5In the First Circle: The First Uncensored Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5When I Come Home Again: 'A page-turning literary gem' THE TIMES, BEST BOOKS OF 2020 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Shepherd Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The War of the Worlds Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dancing at Midnight Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Memory Keeper of Kyiv: A powerful, important historical novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Lords of Discipline Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Andromeda Evolution Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Soldier of the Great War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for The Red Badge of Courage An Episode of the American Civil War
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
The Red Badge of Courage An Episode of the American Civil War - Stephen Crane
Chapter 1
The cold passed reluctantly from the earth, and the retiring fogs revealed an army stretched out on the hills, resting. As the landscape changed from brown to green, the army awakened, and began to tremble with eagerness at the noise of rumors. It cast its eyes upon the roads, which were growing from long troughs of liquid mud to proper thoroughfares. A river, amber-tinted in the shadow of its banks, purled at the army's feet; and at night, when the stream had become of a sorrowful blackness, one could see across it the red, eyelike gleam of hostile camp-fires set in the low brows of distant hills.
Once a certain tall soldier developed virtues and went resolutely to wash a shirt. He came flying back from a brook waving his garment bannerlike. He was swelled with a tale he had heard from a reliable friend, who had heard it from a truthful cavalryman, who had heard it from his trustworthy brother, one of the orderlies at division headquarters. He adopted the important air of a herald in red and gold.
We're goin' t' move t'morrah--sure,
he said pompously to a group in the company street. We're goin' 'way up the river, cut across, an' come around in behint 'em.
To his attentive audience he drew a loud and elaborate plan of a very brilliant campaign. When he had finished, the blue-clothed men scattered into small arguing groups between the rows of squat brown huts. A negro teamster who had been dancing upon a cracker box with the hilarious encouragement of twoscore soldiers was deserted. He sat mournfully down. Smoke drifted lazily from a multitude of quaint chimneys.
It's a lie! that's all it is--a thunderin' lie!
said another private loudly. His smooth face was flushed, and his hands were thrust sulkily into his trouser's pockets. He took the matter as an affront to him. I don't believe the derned old army's ever going to move. We're set. I've got ready to move eight times in the last two weeks, and we ain't moved yet.
The tall soldier felt called upon to defend the truth of a rumor he himself had introduced. He and the loud one came near to fighting over it.
A corporal began to swear before the assemblage. He had just put a costly board floor in his house, he said. During the early spring he had refrained from adding extensively to the comfort of his environment because he had felt that the army might start on the march at any moment. Of late, however, he had been impressed that they were in a sort of eternal camp.
Many of the men engaged in a spirited debate. One outlined in a peculiarly lucid manner all the plans of the commanding general. He was opposed by men who advocated that there were other plans of campaign. They clamored at each other, numbers making futile bids for the popular attention. Meanwhile, the soldier who had fetched the rumor bustled about with much importance. He was continually assailed by questions.
What's up, Jim?
Th'army's goin' t' move.
Ah, what yeh talkin' about? How yeh know it is?
Well, yeh kin b'lieve me er not, jest as yeh like. I don't care a hang.
There was much food for thought in the manner in which he replied. He came near to convincing them by disdaining to produce proofs. They grew much excited over it.
There was a youthful private who listened with eager ears to the words of the tall soldier and to the varied comments of his comrades. After receiving a fill of discussions concerning marches and attacks, he went to his hut and crawled through an intricate hole that served it as a door. He wished to be alone with some new thoughts that had lately come to him.
He lay down on a wide bunk that stretched across the end of the room. In the other end, cracker boxes were made to serve as furniture. They were grouped about the fireplace. A picture from an illustrated weekly was upon the log walls, and three rifles were paralleled on pegs. Equipments hung on handy projections, and some tin dishes lay upon a small pile of firewood. A folded tent was serving as a roof. The sunlight, without, beating upon it, made it glow a light yellow shade. A small window shot an oblique square of whiter light upon the cluttered floor. The smoke from the fire at times neglected the clay chimney and wreathed into the room, and this flimsy chimney of clay and sticks made endless threats to set ablaze the whole establishment.
The youth was in a little trance of astonishment. So they were at last going to fight. On the morrow, perhaps, there would be a battle, and he would be in it. For a time he was obliged to labor to make himself believe. He could not accept with assurance an omen that he was about to mingle in one of those great affairs of the earth.
He had, of course, dreamed of battles all his life--of vague and bloody conflicts that had thrilled him with their sweep and fire. In visions he had seen himself in many struggles. He had imagined peoples secure in the shadow of his eagle-eyed prowess. But awake he had regarded battles as crimson blotches on the pages of the past. He had put them as things of the bygone with his thought-images of heavy crowns and high castles. There was a portion of the world's history which he had regarded as the time of wars, but it, he thought, had been long gone over the horizon and had disappeared forever.
From his home his youthful eyes had looked upon the war in his own country with distrust. It must be some sort of a play affair. He had long despaired of witnessing a Greeklike struggle. Such would be no more, he had said. Men were better, or more timid. Secular and religious education had effaced the throat-grappling instinct, or else firm finance held in check the passions.
He had burned several times to enlist. Tales of great movements shook the land. They might not be distinctly Homeric, but there seemed to be much glory in them. He had read of marches, sieges, conflicts, and he had longed to see it all. His busy mind had drawn for him large pictures extravagant in color, lurid with breathless deeds.
But his mother had discouraged him. She had affected to look with some contempt upon the quality of his war ardor and patriotism. She could calmly seat herself and with no apparent difficulty give him many hundreds of reasons why he was of vastly more importance on the farm than on the field of battle. She had had certain ways of expression that told him that her statements on the subject came from a deep conviction. Moreover, on her side, was his belief that her ethical motive in the argument was impregnable.
At last, however, he had made firm rebellion against this yellow light thrown upon the color of his ambitions. The newspapers, the gossip of the village, his own picturings, had aroused him to an uncheckable degree. They were in truth fighting finely down there. Almost every day the newspaper printed accounts of a decisive victory.
One night, as he lay in bed, the winds had carried to him the clangoring of the church bell as some enthusiast jerked the rope frantically to tell the twisted news of a great battle. This voice of the people rejoicing in the night had made him shiver in a prolonged ecstasy of excitement. Later, he had gone down to his mother's room and had spoken thus: Ma, I'm going to enlist.
Henry, don't you be a fool,
his mother had replied. She had then covered her face with the quilt. There was an end to the matter for that night.
Nevertheless, the next morning he had gone to a town that was near his mother's farm and had enlisted in a company that was forming there. When he had returned home his mother was milking the brindle cow. Four others stood waiting. Ma, I've enlisted,
he had said to her diffidently. There was a short silence. The Lord's will be done, Henry,
she had finally replied, and had then continued to milk the brindle cow.
When he had stood in the doorway with his soldier's clothes on his back, and with the light of excitement and expectancy in his eyes almost defeating the glow of regret for the home bonds, he had seen two tears leaving their trails on his mother's scarred cheeks.
Still, she had disappointed him by saying nothing whatever about returning with his shield or on it. He had privately primed himself for a beautiful scene. He had prepared certain sentences which he thought could be used with touching effect. But her words destroyed his plans. She had doggedly peeled potatoes and addressed him as follows: "You watch out, Henry, an' take good care of yerself in this here fighting business--you watch, an' take good care of yerself. Don't go a-thinkin' you can lick the hull rebel army at the start, because yeh can't. Yer jest one little feller amongst a hull lot of others, and yeh've got to keep quiet an' do what they tell yeh. I know how you are, Henry.
"I've knet yeh eight pair of socks, Henry, and I've put in all yer best shirts, because I want my boy to be jest as warm and comf'able as anybody in the army. Whenever they get holes in 'em, I want yeh to send 'em right-away back to me, so's I kin dern 'em.
"An' allus be careful an' choose yer comp'ny. There's lots of bad men in the army, Henry. The army makes 'em wild, and they like nothing better than the job of leading off a young feller like you, as ain't never been away from home much and has allus had a mother, an' a-learning 'em to drink and swear. Keep clear of them folks, Henry. I don't want yeh to ever do anything, Henry, that yeh would be 'shamed to let me know about. Jest think as if I was a-watchin' yeh. If yeh keep that in yer mind allus, I guess yeh'll come out about right.
"Yeh must allus remember yer father, too, child, an' remember he never drunk a drop of licker in his life, and seldom swore a cross oath.
"I don't know what else to tell yeh, Henry, excepting that yeh must never do no shirking, child, on my account. If so be a time comes when yeh have to be kilt or do a mean thing, why, Henry, don't think of anything 'cept what's right, because there's many a woman has to bear up 'ginst sech things these times, and the Lord 'll take keer of us all.
Don't forgit about the socks and the shirts, child; and I've put a cup of blackberry jam with yer bundle, because I know yeh like it above all things. Good-by, Henry. Watch out, and be a good boy.
He had, of course, been impatient under the ordeal of this speech. It had not been quite what he expected, and he had borne it with an air of irritation. He departed feeling vague relief.
Still, when he had looked back from the gate, he had seen his mother kneeling among the potato parings. Her brown face, upraised, was stained with tears, and her spare form was quivering. He bowed his head and went on, feeling suddenly ashamed of his purposes.
From his home he had gone to the seminary to bid adieu to many schoolmates. They had thronged about him with wonder and admiration. He had felt the gulf now between them and had swelled with calm pride. He and some of his fellows who had donned blue were quite overwhelmed with privileges for all of one afternoon, and it had been a very delicious thing. They had strutted.
A certain light-haired girl had made vivacious fun at his martial spirit, but there was another and darker girl whom he had gazed at steadfastly, and he thought she grew demure and sad at sight of his blue and brass. As he had walked down the path between the rows of oaks, he had turned his head and detected her at a window watching his departure. As he perceived her, she had immediately begun to stare up through the high tree branches at the sky. He had seen a good deal of flurry and haste in her movement as she changed her attitude. He often thought of it.
On the way to Washington his spirit had soared. The regiment was fed and caressed at station after station until the youth had believed that he must be a hero. There was a lavish expenditure of bread and cold meats, coffee, and pickles and cheese. As he basked in the smiles of the girls and was patted and complimented by the old men, he had felt growing within him the strength to do mighty deeds of arms.
After complicated journeyings with many pauses, there had come months of monotonous life in a camp. He had had the belief that real war was a series of death struggles with small time in between for sleep and meals; but since his regiment had come to the field the army had done little but sit still and try to keep warm.
He was brought then gradually back to his old ideas. Greeklike struggles would be no more. Men were better, or more timid. Secular and religious education had effaced the throat-grappling instinct, or else