Publisher Description
An early classic of American literature, "The Red Badge of Courage" tells the story of private Henry Fleming, a young soldier in the Union Army, who flees the battlefield and later returns in shame, seeking to redeem himself by receiving a war wound - a “red badge of courage” - in the conflict. Hailed for over a century as one of the finest war novels ever written, Crane’s tale is an early example of American Realism and Naturalism and, despite the author never having seen a battlefield, has been praised for its accurate and chilling portrait of war. The Red Badge of Courage was an immediate sensation and soon became an international bestseller, cementing Crane as a celebrated literary talent at just twenty-four. It has gone on to become one of the most widely read and admired books of early American literature. This unabridged version of the text also includes a brief biography of the author.
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About Stephen Crane
Stephen Crane (1871–1900) was an American novelist, poet, and journalist. He worked as a reporter of slum life in New York and a highly paid war correspondent for newspaper tycoons William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer. He wrote many works of fiction, poems, and accounts of war, all well received but none as acclaimed as his 1895 Civil War novel, The Red Badge of Courage. Today he is considered one of the most innovative American writers of the 1890s and one of the founders of literary realism.