The Red Badge of Courage Essay - 834 Words

The Red Badge of Courage is not a war novel. It is a novel about life. This novel illustrates the trials and tribulations of everyday life. Stephen Crane uses the war as a comparison to everyday life. He is semi-saying that life is like a war. It is a struggle of warriors#8212;the every day people#8212;against the odds. In these battles of everyday life, people can change. In The Red Badge of Courage, the main character, Henry Fleming, undergoes a character change that shows how people must overcome their fears and the invisible barriers that hold them back from being the best people#8212;warriors, in the sense that life is war#8212;they can be. Henry has a character change that represents how all humans have general sense of†¦show more content†¦He proclaimed to himself that if a squirrel took flight when a rock was thrown at it, it was alright that he ran when his life was on the line. This was a selfish reason for fleeing, in the broad sense. Henry#8217;s fear o f death was a natural human fear that would not work in a war. This is where Henry#8217;s character change took place. In everyday life, humans often go about their natural business not thinking at about what they are doing. Henry, in a sense, represented this in his war efforts. Henry was so busy thinking about death and running and all these selfish ideas about the war that he could not operate as a good soldier. A good soldier is one that goes about fighting, killing, defending and even dying for the cause. These may not be great things, but they are what soldiers do. Henry was the epitome of not doing these soldier#8217;s tasks. In order for Henry to do his job the best, he had to become unthinking. This was a selfless act rather than a selfish act that would benefit the army, rather than hinder it. Once Henry got past his invisible barrier, his fear, he was able to become an unthinking war machine. This is similar to everyday life. For humans to do the best job poss ible, whatever it may be, they must not think. If they think too much about the task at hand, they will become preoccupied with it and fail. This was Henry#8217;s problem; he overcame his fear of death and became the warShow MoreRelatedRed Badge of Courage Essay1030 Words   |  5 PagesLizzy Wood The Red Badge of Courage Essay 11.20.11/6th Hour At times he regarded the wounded soldiers in an envious way. He conceived persons with torn bodies to be peculiarly happy. He wished that he, too, had a wound, a red badge of courage. (Ch.9, Pg. 61) Jim Conklin, Wilson, and the tattered man are not only alike in some ways, but also have differences. The purpose of this essay is to tell you the similarities between the tall soldier, the loud soldier, andRead MoreEssay on The Red Badge of Courage1496 Words   |  6 PagesThe Red Badge of Courage The Red Badge of Courage, by Steven Crane, has been considered one of the greatest war novels of all time. 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By definition, isolation is the process or fact of isolating or being isolated. The process of isolation is found in various types of people, yet it always goes unnoticed, for you could be the most popular person in the world, and yet still feel so small. Henry the young soldier in The Red Badge of Courage novel, goes through a lot when war breaks out in his country. He feels isolated from everyone else