Stephen Crane, The Red Badge of Courage

Stephen Crane, The Red Badge of Courage, Bantam Classic, New York (Introduction by Alfred Kazin) 1983.

The Red Badge of Courage, published in 1895, has long been considered the first great “modern” novel of war by an American—the first novel of literary distinction to present war without heroics and this in a spirit of total irony and skepticism. (vii)

…written entirely from instinct by a young newspaperman in his early twenties who had never seen a war. Stephen Crane was to see a good deal of war after he wrote his famous book. As a correspondent for famous newspaper syndicates of the time, he was to accompany a filibustering expedition by Cubans seeks the liberation of their island from Spain; he was in Cuba reporting the Spanish-American War and in Greece for the Graeco-Turkish war. It was typical of his to say, after he had seen hard fighting in Greece, “The Red Badge is all right.” And since he had been changed with imitating Tolstoy in War and Peace when he wrote The Red Badge, he amusedly looked into War and Peace for the first time and typically never finished it. “It goes on and on like Texas,” he complained. (vii)

Great stories about war usually have not only been written by veterans of war but have depended on the blood and thunder of war, the irresistible reality of violence, to produce certain effects. Crane, in this as in so many other things, was an iconoclast; The Red Badge of Courage deals less in external violence than in mental states. (viii)

Crane was born in Newark, New Jersey, in 1871, the fourteenth child of a prominent Methodist preacher… Crane liked to boast that during the American Revolution “the Cranes were pretty hot people.” The children of ministers have a reputation for rebelliousness, and Crane in his stoical and tight-lipped way was no exception. … It was characteristic of his not to take formal education seriously; though he never finished college, (viii)

Crane was not yet twenty-nine when he died in Germany, 1900, after having vainly sought in the Black Forest some respite form lung disease. One of the main sources of The Red Badge may well have been Crane’s early sense of death. … Crane’s biographer John Berryman was sure that one impulse behind all Crane’s writing was “fear.” If so, he certainly hid it in a defiant fashion. (viii)

…another clue to The Red Badge is Crane’s personal recklessness, his insistence on playing a tough, indifferent role. Before he died so frighteningly young that many of his friends and admirers felt that he had thrown his life away, he actually defied the New York Police Department by testifying for a prostitute arrested by corrupt policemen. Later, he defied Victorian morality by living with a woman who had operated a high-class brothel in Florida. (ix)

Crane somehow brought to focus in his person, in his work, the sudden skepticism of a generation that had seen religion’s authority weakened by science and conventional patriotism abandoned for American imperialism and sabre-rattling in the 1890s. By the end of the century, when Crane died, America was to seem as aggressive in foreign policy as its European counterparts. … And if “God was dead,” as they first began to hint in the nineteenth century, His absence was marked by writers principally in the 1890s, (ix)

He was to write in one of his astonishingly chill, totally skeptical poems that “God is cold,” and he repeated this in stanza after stanza as if to assure the reader that he meant it. (x)

Like so many of the best American writers, Crane learned as a reporter to write quickly, plainly, but also to harden this style. The last thing he ever wanted was to wear his heart on his sleeve; The Red Badge, which Hemingway proclaimed to be an American classic, had an obvious influence on Hemingway’s own tight-lipped style. … journalistic experience. … (x)

Crane’s restless temperament and his love of sensation, even more important to The Red Badge, were initially excited by the teeming mass life of immigrants on the Lower East Side of New York. In his last years, when he lived in England, he wrote to the critic James Huneker: “I told a seemingly sane man that I got my artistic education of the Bowery, … The link between Maggie and The Red Badge of Courage is Crane’s recognition that “the sense of a city is war.” (x-xi)

It is also significant that war had become a principal factor of history in the 1890s. The Civil War had been over for more than a generation, so that there was a tendency to romanticize it—especially in the South—in the slick fashionable fiction of the time. (xi)

The twenty-one-year-old Crane who wrote The Red Badge in ten successive nights… (xi)

American “idealism” in fighting the Civil War. The 1890s were plainly forgetting that the war was not fought to emancipate the slaves but to keep the Union together at all costs. (xii)

What impressed the veterans was Crane’s instinctive sense of battle and his scorn for the rhetoric of war. It was psychology, not history, that drew the twenty-one-year-old to write about war at all. Clearly, the psychology of war was deep in Crane himself, perhaps in what John Berryman insisted was Crane’s “fear.” (xii)

War is traditionally the ordeal of young men. It is also the most extreme example is thrown up by any civilization that there are forces that youth ignorantly and tragically thinks it can control. /
What is most noticeable about The Red Badge is that this illusion [xii] of “control” and confidence—the real theme of the book—is always before the reader. Although the youth learns soon enough that he controls nothing, that he is just another helpless solider under fire, and becomes sick with fear until he runs away, his actual “desertion” is never noticed. Here is a joke, if you like, at the expense of Henry Fleming’s actual cowardice, just as Henry’s eventual “courage” will also be treated as a kind of joke, for in this courage is as mechanical as desertion. (xiii)

Performing an act of unintentional heroism (he seizes a Confederate flag from its falling bearer), he is acclaimed at battle’s end. He is now, and at last, perfectly satisfied with himself. He has got through his initiation, his real battle—with his own fear … satisfaction with himself is a passing phase. War is so mad and terrible that nothing is easier for the actual participant to forget—and to turn into something utterly different form the actual moments of terror and madness. (xiii)

Of course not everybody reads The Red Badge this way. Critical discussion of the book centers on a fundamental disagreement. Howe seriously did Crane mean us to take the personality of Henry Fleming? (xiii)

Not only is the youth never in control, he thinks that his leaders have malevolently exposed him. Then, helplessly leaning on his comrades for some assurance, he realizes that they are as bewildered, helpless, and even furtive as he. He gets his courage, such as it is, form his sense of common doom. (xiv)

It would be a great mistake to assume because of Crane’s detachment that he himself is as bitter about the ravages of war as actual writer-soldiers form Tolstoy to the veterans of Vietnam have usually been. (xiv)

Far from being a “realist” merely, far from limiting himself to the gray, bleak “forces” determining human behavior, Crane wanted nothing so much as to describe the moment-by-moment riot … As Joseph Conrad said, Crane was chiefly an “impressionist and only an impressionist.” (xv)

The cold passed reluctantly from the earth, and the retiring fogs revealed an army stretched out on the hills, resting. (Opening Sentence, 1)

But his mother had discouraged him. She had affected to look with some contempt upon the quality of his war ardor and patriotism. (3-4)

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 prolongued ecstasy of excitement. Later, he had gone down to his mother’s room and had spoken thus: “Ma, I’m going to enlist.” (4)

“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. (5)

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 might deeds of arms. (6)

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. [6]
/
He was brought then gradually back to his old ideas. Greek-like struggles would be no more. 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 grown to regard himself merely as part of a vast blue demonstration. His province was to look out, as far as he could, for his personal comfort. (7)

It had suddenly appeared to him that perhaps he might run. … He was an unknown quantity. He saw that he would again be obliged to experiment as he had in early youth. He must accumulate information of himself, (8)

Camp fires, like red, peculiar blossoms, dotted the night. (16)

The insect voices of the night sang solemnly. (19)

The youth thought the damp fog of early morning moved from the rush of a great body of troops. (20)

Regarding death thus out of the corner of his eye, he conceived it to be nothing but rest, and he was filled with a momentary astonishment that he should have made an extraordinary commotion over the mere matter of getting killed. He would die; he would go to some place where he would be understood. It was useless to expect appreciation of his profound and fine senses from such men as the lieutenant. He must look to the grave for comprehension. (26)

He suddenly lost concern for himself, and forgot to look at a menacing fate. He became not a man but a member. He felt that something of which he was a part—a regiment, an army, a cause, or a country—was in a crisis. He was welded into a common personality which was dominated by a single desire. For some moments he could not flee, no more than a little finger can commit a revolution form a hand. (32)

Following this came a red rage. He developed the acute exasperation of a pestered animal, a well-meaning cow worried by dogs. He had a mad feeling against his rifle, which could only be used against one life at a time. He wished to rush forward and strange with his fingers. He craved a power that would enable him to make a world-sweeping gesture and brush all back. His impotency appeared to him, and made his rage into that of a driven beast. (33)

There was a tattered man, fouled with dust, blood and powder stain from hair to shoes, who trudged quietly at the youth’s side. He was listening with eagerness and much humility to the lurid descriptions of a bearded sergeant. His lean features wore an expression of awe and admiration. He was like a listener in a country store to wondrous tales told among the sugar barrels. (50)

“I was talkin’ ‘cross pickets with a boy from Georgie, onct, an’ that boy, he ses, ‘Your fellers’ll all run like hell when they onct hearn a gun,’ he ses. ‘Mebbe they will,’ I ses, ‘but I don’t b’lieve none of it,’ I ses; ‘an’ b’diminey,’ I ses back t’’um, ‘mebbe your fellers’ll all run like hell when they onct hearn a gun,’ I ses. He larfed. Well, they didn’t run t’-day, did they, hey? No, sir! They fit, an’fit, an’fit.” (51)

“Yeh know Tom Jamison, he lives next door t’me up home. He’s a nice feller, he is, an’ we was allus good friends. Smart, too. Smart as a steel trap. (58)

…terror-stricken wagon. They fled like soft, ungainly animals. All the roarers and lashers served to help him to magnify the dangers and horrors of the engagement that he might try to prove to himself that the thing with which men could charge him was in truth a symmetrical act. There was an amount of pleasure to him in watching the wild march of this vindication. (61)

Then the difficulties of the thing began to drag at him. He hesitated, balancing awkwardly on one foot.
He had no rifle; he could not fight with his hands, said he resentfully to his plan. Well, rifles could be had for the picking. They were extraordinarily profuse.
Also, he continued, it would be a miracle if he found his regiment. Well, he could fight with any regiment. (62)

The youth was horror-stricken. He stared in agony and amazement. He forgot that he was engaged in combating the universe the universe. He threw aside his mental pamphlets on the philosophy of the retreated and rules for the guidance of the damned. (66)

Within him some something bade to cry out. He had the impulse to make a rallying speech, to sing a battle hymn, but he could only get his tongue to call into the air: “Why—why—what—what’s th’matter?” … The youth, after rushing about and throwing interrogations at the heedless bands of retreating infantry, finally clutched a man by the arm. They swung around face to face. /
“Why—why—“ stammered the youth struggling with his balking tongue.
The man screamed: “Let go me! Let go me!” his face was livid and his eyes were rolling uncontrolled. He was heaving and panting. He still grasped his rifle, perhaps having forgotten to release his hold upon it. He tugged frantically, and the youth being compelled to lean forward was dragged several paces. [67] … “Well, then!” bawled the man in a lurid rage. He adroitly and fiercely swung his rifle. It crushed upon the youth’s head. The man ran on. … Sometimes he would achieve a position half erect, battle with the air for a moment, and then fall again, grabbing at the grass. (68)

When the youth awoke it seemed to him that he had been asleep for a thousand years, and he felt sure that he opened his eyes upon an unexpected world. Gray mists were slowly shifting before the first efforts of the sunrays. An impending splendor could be seen in the eastern sky. An icy dew had chilled his face, and immediately upon arousing he curled farther down into his blankets. He stared for a while at the leaves overhead, moving in a heraldic wind of the day. (77)

Suddenly there was a hollow rumble of drums. (78)

The youth had a thought that it would not be handsome for him to freely condemn other men. He made an attempt to restrain himself, but the words upon his tongue were too bitter. He presently began a long and intricate denunciation of the commander of the forces. /
“Mebbe, it wa’n’t all his fault—not all together. He did th’best he knowed. It’s our luck t’git licked often,” said his friend in a weary tone. He was trudging along with stooped shoulders and shifting eyes like a man who has been caned and kicked.
“Well, don’t we fight like the devil? Don’t we do all that men can?” demanded the youth loudly.
He was secretly dumbfounded at this sentiment when it came from his lips. (87)

When the enemy seemed falling back before him and his fellows, he went instantly forward, like a dog who, seeing his foes lagging, turns and insists upon being pursued. And when he was compelled to retire again, he did it slowly, sullenly, taking steps of wrathful despair.
Once he, in his intent hate, was almost alone, and was firing, when all those near him had ceased. He was so engrossed in his occupation that he was not aware of a lull.
He was recalled by a hoarse laugh and a sentence that came to his ears in a voice of contempt and amazement. “Yeh infernal fool, don’t yeh know enough t’quit when there ain’t anything t’shoot at? Good God!”
He turned then and, pausing with his rifle thrown half into position, looked at the blue line of his comrades. During this moment of leisure they seemed all to be engaged in staring with astonishment at him. They had become spectators. Turning to the front again he saw, under the lifted smoke, a deserted ground. (93)

There was some grim rejoicing by the men. “By thunder, I bet this army’ll never see another new reg’ment like us!”
“Yout bet!
A dog, a woman, an’a walnut tree,
Th’more yeh beat ‘em, th’better they be!
That’s like us.” (94)

The youth walked stolidly into the midst of the mob, and with his flag in his hands took a stand as if he expected an attempted to push him to the ground. … His friend came to him. “Well, Henry, I guess this is good-by—John.”
“Oh, shut up, you damned fool!” replied the youth, and he wouldn’t not look at the other. (107)

…and by it they had revenged themselves upon their misgivings, and upon the foe. (109)

Questions were wafted to them. … “Goin’ home now, boys?”
One shouted in taunting mimicry: “Oh, mother, come quick an’ look at th’ so’jers!”
There was no reply form the bruised and battered regiment, save that one man made broadcast challenges to fist fights… (110)

“An’ I’d break th’feller’s neck if he was as big as a church. (113)

Yet gradually he mustered force to put the sin at a distance. And at last his eyes seemed to open to some new ways. He fond that he could look back upon the brass and bombast of his earlier gospels and see them truly. He was gleeful when he discovered that he now despised them.
With the conviction came a store of assurance. He felt a quiet manhood, non-assertive but of sturdy and strong blood. (127)