The Red Badge of Courage was Stephen Crane’s best known novel. It was one of his two great
ones, the other being the underrated Maggie: A Girl of the Streets,
which was also a ground-breaking work, taking up the subject of women's plights
in industrial society as Red Badge takes up men’s plight in wartime.
The story is a
cerebral one, about what the protagonist, new recruit Henry Fleming, an
18-year-old Yankee, thinks. As in most Crane writing, most characters remain
nameless, such as the Tall Soldier. The story starts with all the enthusiasm of
newbies going to war. Then Fleming faces the boredom of military camp. As a
writer famously said, 99% of the time is boredom, 1% terror. Crane introduces
us to that subject through this novel.
In the first
battle, Henry runs, but he is covered by the confusion and gets to return and
reunite with his fellows. He picks up a fake injury to justify this by being
bonked on the head by another retreating soldier.
In the last
section, Fleming steps up as the flag carrier, fights well, and survives for
another day. A later Crane short story, “The Veteran,” features Fleming as an
older man, so presumably he survived the Civil War. But this is all left open
ended in the novel, which only covers a few weeks time in the four-year war.
Listen to “The Veteran” to see how it all turned out and was remembered.
Download and start listening now!