##ymbolism, And Allegory In Red Badge Of Courage By Stephen Crane

In Crane’s “A Mystery of Heroism” he uses literary elements to create Naturalist themes. One main belief of Naturalists is that someone’s life is determined by environment, chance, and heredity. Crane uses the setting and characters to create this theme. In the story it says, “Too, he wondered why he did not feel some keen agony of fear cutting his sense like a knife.” This quote shows that the main character is not afraid. The setting of the war is one of the reasons he does not feel fear. He has probably been in a more fearful situation since he has been in the war. If he had not been a soldier and been in this setting he would be more fearful. Crane uses characters to create this main idea by showing the other characters who argue with Collins until he goes to the well. In “A Mystery of Heroism” it says, “ ‘Of course, yeh will! Yeh’ll run through that there

O’Brien used imagery to illustrate the war in a sense to make you feel as if you were there with the soldiers. While staying short and simple, he was also very specific of the details. “Ted Lavender was shot in the head on his way back from peeing. He lay with his mouth open. The teeth were broken. There was a swollen black bruise under his left eye. The cheekbone was gone” [423] is a perfect example of how O’Brien used imagery. This passage makes you see in your mind what the soldiers seen through their eyes.

Two northern boys in the novels, “Soldier’s Heart,” and “The Red Badge of Courage,” suffer through the journey and hardships, loss of loved ones, and war. The contrasts in these works are few, however the variances in stories minister support in helping each book to stand out, and separate from the other. The similarities between books are uncanny, so similar, in fact that throughout the duration of the novels differentiating the novels becomes increasingly problematic for the reader. Also, the similarities concerning the two books “Soldier’s Heart” and “The Red Badge of Courage” aid the reader in understanding the mind-set of a soldier during a war. The comparisons and differences of the

War can force young soldiers to grow up quickly. In The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming is no exception. He enters the war with romanticized ideas of what war is like, and leaves with those ideas very much changed.

In The Red Badge of Courage, Henry shows immaturity by enlisting in the army and being naïve about the war. Henry explains that since he was young, he dreamed about the war of the bloody battles that the soldiers fought in. He thinks fighting in a war will make him a hero and achieve glory. He enlisted in the army, although his mother opposed the decision. However, when he makes it to the camp, he had to wait many weeks in the camps until he was called up to battle, and he started to doubt his place in the army.

the purpose of Crane’s account was meant to reveal incidences in the soldiers’ lives, for example where they took place in the field. Crane wanted to make sure the reader could feel the same feelings as the soldiers, Crane wanted the reader to understand it felt like to be out on the

4. From Crane’s passage, we learn of the fear and confusion of battle. We also learn about the horrors of death.

The Red Badge of Courage presents the main character Henry, or “the youth”, as a cowardly craven of a human being who battles egoism. He believes, albeit naïvely, in traditional

Written by Stephen Crane, The Red Badge of Courage is a novel filled with irony. This story is written in the point of view of the main character, Henry Fleming, and tells about his maturation through the war. Including the title, from the beginning to the end of the book there is irony present. The use of irony by Crane helps create a lot of discussion for critics. Henry’s internal debate is a main source of irony in this novel. Also, his fantasy of how he thought war was going to be and how it turned out is ironic.

In Stephan Crane's The Red Badge of Courage is a great example of realistic literature. Within the story we are introduced to a youth named Henry who loved the idea of being a hero in war, but didn't understand the severity of battle. The emotions he feels and what he sees and imagines is what makes it realistic. What happens in this novel is common as to what would happen to any youth that was ignorant about war. The Red Badge of Courage is considered realistic literature, because of the normal human emotions Henry feels before the fighting and before signing up to join.

The Red Badge of Courage is a classic story that stands the test of time. It is about a heroic young boy named Henry Fleming. He is excited to finally enlist in the war and get his “red badge of courage”, a wound from combat. He wishes to impress friends and females alike. But what makes Henry flee from the war?

“So it came to pass that as he trudged from the place of blood and wrath his soul changed” (Crane 139). The Red Badge of Courage is a great American classic, and this wonderful quote sums up the entire novel from start to finish. The novel is a novel about a solider in the civil war who deals with the difficulties of being in war. The novel follows and captures his journey using many literary elements. Crane’s use of style, plot, setting, and characters help enhance the story. The use of these literary elements helps enhance the novel and help readers understand the struggles of a solider during the civil war.

War forces young soldiers to grow up quickly. In Stephen Crane’s Civil War novel, The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming is no exception. He is faced with the hard reality of war and this forces him to readjust his romantic beliefs about war. Through the novel, the reader can trace the growth and development of Henry through these four stages: (1) romanticizing war and the heroic role each soldier plays, (2) facing the realities of war, (3) lying to himself to maintain his self-importance, and (4) realistic awareness of his abilities and place in life. Through Henry’s experiences in his path to self-discovery, he is strongly affected by events that help shape his ideology of war, death,

The Red Badge of Courage, written by Stephan Crane in 1895 gives a detailed, yet, fictional account of Henry Fleming, a farm boy who joins the Union Army in the American Civil War. Before Henry is battle-tested, he ponders his courage and questions whether he will be able to fight the urge to flee from battle. Henry does indeed end up deserting his comrades however he ultimately overcomes his guilt and becomes one of the best fighters in his regiment. In order to depict a realistic and relatable war scene, Crane includes Henry’s realistic thought-process and emotion in his struggles to maintain courage. The narrative simply revealed war in a manner that was divergent to all prior forms of literature in the 19th century. Previous novels predominately entailed the glorious and romantic aspects of war rather than the tedious, gritty, and gruesome details of close combat. Instead, Crane broke the barriers of literary norms in war-related literature; the novel depicted a pragmatic experience of combat from the eyes of an inexperienced and frightened youth. In the Red Badge of Courage, Stephan Crane primarily uses religious and gory imagery as well as symbolism to contrast the romantic conceptions of war versus the reality of experiencing battle.

The Red Badge of Courage is a story of self-discovery. The novel is set during the American Civil War, on multiple battlefields. Henry Fleming is a young soldier fighting for the Union. He first joined the army because he dreams of the glories of battle and performing heroic deeds in battle. Although Henry wishes to be a brave soldier, when in battle, his survival instincts take over, and he begins debating fight or flight. His desire to become a soldier and his instinct to survive introduces the main plot and conflict of the story: During a battle, he runs away. This causes him to see the contradiction in himself and it becomes an emotional conflict for him to solve out the contradiction. Because he is so hung up on the image of the war hero, even though he wasn’t shot at, but hit by a fellow soldier, he lies to his comrades that the wound was a bullet wound. He’s lied once to them about fighting bravely in battle when in actuality he ran away, and he lied again telling them that the head would which he actually got from another soldier was a bullet wound. The climax of the plot occurs when Henry redeems himself at another major battle by fighting bravely and taking up the Union flag when the flag bearer is wounded. He ignores his fears and faces the battle like the hero he’s dreamed of and he overcomes his survival instinct. The resolution happens after the battle is over and Henry survives. He reflects on the decisions he’s made and sees how much he’d