“From his home his youthful eyes had looked upon the war in his own country with distrust. It must be some sort of a play affair”(Crane 3). Henry Fleming, the main character in Stephen Crane’s novel The Red badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil War, records the transformation of Henry Fleming a mercurial and immature adolescent who transforms into a war-ready soldier through the experience. Stephen Crane published the novel in 1895 thirty years after the Civil War. Crane uses naturalism to show how Henry learns about courage and how in the end we all have the same fate. Crane also used the naturalism to show how Henry was helpless and unsure, and how he used his natural instincts to act according to the war-taking place right in
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He first views the war as not being as heroic as he expected it to be, but as the tall soldiers start to prepare for the invasion he quickly realizes that this is no game. Once the camp started marching Henry becomes afraid of what he is about to be face to face with and starts to lose his mind. Naturalism beings to take place during this time because he is unsure what he is about to do for the upcoming fight. The larger force is the war taking place and him not knowing what his role is going to be. Henry now realizes that he has no control over the outcome of war. In the beginning of the novel he expected to be the hero, but now he realizes he is apart of something way bigger than what he expected. Henry’s romantic point of view of war clashes with the naturalistic prospective of war, that shows the irony in what Henry expects to happen versus what actually happens. The veteran soldiers were preparing for war and scaring him into thinking that the war was something where they all could die. ”So he went t’ht’ hospital disregardless of th’fight. Three fingers was crunched. Th’ dern doctor wanted t’ amputate m’” (Crane). That scared Henry even more into thinking he was not ready for war. Henry begins to get involved in the war and quickly begins to lose his selfish ways. He is not worried about the feeling of winning praise and attention anymore, he is so caught up in the war
He first views the war as not being as heroic as he expected it to be, but as the tall soldiers start to prepare for the invasion he quickly realizes that this is no game. Once the camp started marching Henry becomes afraid of what he is about to be face to face with and starts to lose his mind. Naturalism beings to take place during this time because he is unsure what he is about to do for the upcoming fight. The larger force is the war taking place and him not knowing what his role is going to be. Henry now realizes that he has no control over the outcome of war. In the beginning of the novel he expected to be the hero, but now he realizes he is apart of something way bigger than what he expected. Henry’s romantic point of view of war clashes with the naturalistic prospective of war, that shows the irony in what Henry expects to happen versus what actually happens. The veteran soldiers were preparing for war and scaring him into thinking that the war was something where they all could die. ”So he went t’ht’ hospital disregardless of th’fight. Three fingers was crunched. Th’ dern doctor wanted t’ amputate m’” (Crane). That scared Henry even more into thinking he was not ready for war. Henry begins to get involved in the war and quickly begins to lose his selfish ways. He is not worried about the feeling of winning praise and attention anymore, he is so caught up in the war