Red Badge of Courage - Where the Metal of Heroes Are Forged

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English 112

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“Where the Metal of Heroes are Forged”

Civil War veterans lauded The Red Badge of Courage written by Stephen Crane in 1895 as virtually a transcript of a soldier’s experience. Crane’s vivid and accurate depiction of the thoughts and combat experiences of the main character Private Henry Fleming is the reason why so many veterans identify with this novel. The Red Badge of Courage was considered “the first great modern war novel by an American” by many critics. What you may find astounding is Stephen Crane had never personally experienced combat or war when he wrote the novel at the ripe old age of twenty four. Many veterans would swear that Crane must have been in the Civil War to have nailed the experience so closely. So what caused these grizzled veterans to think so highly of Crane’s novel? We will examine why Civil War veterans saw Crane’s character Private Henry Fleming and his actions and thoughts on the battlefield as a reflection of their very real war experiences.

This novel appears on the surface as the simple story of a simple soldier facing battle for the very first time. Hundreds if not thousands of books have been written from a fictional perspective on the Civil War; however this work still stands out as a classic. Perhaps it is because in this novel the reader can experience not only the actions of a common soldier, as the vast majority of Civil War veterans were, but also Crane gets right his thoughts and feelings. It is important to realize that in this novel the protagonist, Henry, is portrayed as “an unsophisticated, inarticulate farm boy” (McDermott 324). His values and reasoning for joining the war are very simple, glory, patriotism and adventure. Early in the novel we discover that Henry has “dreamed of battles all of his life” (Crane 3). His impression of war was steeped in a distant historical vision of castles and knights and of great men accomplishing great deeds. In reviewing James M. McPherson's...