Critical Analyses of The Red Badge of Courage

In general, Stephen Crane's The Red Badge of Courage is regarded as a great work of the Realistic literary time period. Many critics of this work cite Crane as a true genius for his ability to make a story of the civil war period, a period taking place before his birth, seem incredibly realistic and accurate to the personal scale of this war. I agree that this story seems to be written by a veteran of the war. Crane really did his homework when writing this novel. He interviewed many many veterans of the war to be sure to have an accurate depiction of the battlefield. This is something that I really can commend him on. Although I may not be the biggest fan of his writing style, I like that he got his facts straight and tried to honor these veterans through reality.

The Dial controversies that Crane faced after writing his novel are a very interesting topic in my opinion. I am a big fan of debate through actual words and reasoning, and these ideas seemed to triumph. General McClurg, writer of the magazine the Dial wrote that Crane was "un-patriotic" in that he portrayed the American soldier as a coward. McClurg's argument, in my opinion, seems to be based on emotions rather than actual facts. The General fails to see the psychological growth of Henry throughout the novel into a courageous individual. Many arguments were sent into the magazine in favor of Crane's novel.

I am kind of surprised that English critics of Crane's work were so accepting. American authors had a real job in convincing English author's of their merits and knowledge. Crane did so with new, informal writing styles. It surprises me that this form of writing could win over such harsh critics. It also surprises me that American critics would be so harsh of his work. I guess this makes sense, however. American authors needed to be harsh on each other seeing as they were all in a fight to make their writing the best in the world.

Red Badge of Courage: Chapters 1-8

Stephen Crane's The Red Badge of Courage is a novel of the Realistic period in literature. The novel demonstrates exactly what the thoughts of this period were; The writing style is very descriptive and focuses on realistic events in the everyday life of a civil war soldier. Throughout the story, Crane uses more psychological events than actual events. When actual events are used, they are only to give the main character, Henry, something to react to psychologically. One example of such an event would be Henry's going into the army. After this happens Henry is faced with nervousness about how he will react in battle. Will he run? Will he fight? He won't know until he enters the field of battle. And yet he poses the question to himself constantly. Then to others. He basically overworks himself over it. In the end he fights, but then later in battle runs away as many others around him are fleeing.

Some may classify this as realism for it's dry and boring style of writing. I would happen to be one of these people. We haven't read much Realism in our class yet, but this book, so far, has caused paradigms in my mind about this period in American literature. The book is very boring in my opinion, and I can't force myself to sit and read it like I am able to do with most other books. It's the sort of book that I need to read a little bit of at a time, and this process is foreign to me. I, therefore, retain much less knowledge of the story from one sitting to the next. It is a complex psychological story which is even less beneficial for my remembering of the story.

When first attempting to read this novel I only took in the actual events that Henry's regiment faced. Somehow, my mind filtered out all of the psychological aspects of the story. As I have previously stated, not many events transpired in these first chapters. This may have contributed to my boredom while reading.

Veteran's Day Field Trip

On Friday, November 13 (Yes, Friday the Thirteenth! I was scared too!), our school took an all day field trip in honor of all of the Veterans that have served in the United States military. Much to my surprise, this was a very interesting and educational trip. We went to a war museum, an Airforce base, Camp Butler cemetery, Oak Ridge Memorial, and other such locations. I found the Camp Lincoln War Museum to be the most interesting of all of the places that we visited. It was the first location that my group went to, and it really helped to catch my attention for the rest of the day. The museum was chock full of war artifacts such as weapons and uniforms spanning all the way from the Civil war until modern times. It was interesting to see the progression in technology from then to now. They also had interesting things such as a target that President Lincoln test-fired a gun at and the captured wooden leg of Santa Anna.

The Air National Guard was very interesting as well. At this location we looked at an F-16 fighter jet undergoing maintenance. This peaked my interest in Engineering. The aircraft was very complex in its inner-workings. We also saw a group of airforce members grilling steaks. It was good to find out that military-folk enjoy good food just like me. It was good to know that they were humans, I guess.

At Camp Butler, we placed flowers on the graves of veterans from many wars throughout history. One girl, I don't know her name, had a very emotional response upon seeing the graves of many of her veteran family members. This response was very touching to me. My great-uncle just passed away this summer. He was a veteran of World War II and was awarded a purple heart after being shot in the leg. I know that I miss him a lot, so this girl's situation must have been very sad seeing as many of her family members were veterans.

Realistic Dreams

I don't have dreams very often, but when I do they are incredibly realistic. Actually, just this past Friday I had a very hyper-real dream. It was ridiculous in that it's not something that would never happen, yet it seemed very real. Someone that I know who plays the trumpet was playing piano expertly in this dream. The piano, however, did not only have keys side to side, but also front to back. This all sounds really odd now that I actually think of it. It was so realistic though! The dream ended with a song on the piano. I then woke up and my phone was ringing to the piano song. As it turned out, it was 6:50. Friday was one of the nights of the musical and I was supposed to be there at 6:30 for the 7:00 show. This goes back to my biggest fear blog, forgetfulness. I was just so tired when I got home that I pretty much just passed out. I only awoke because of the phone call I was getting to find out where I was from the other people in the pit. I ended up getting ready in about two minutes and getting to the show three songs in. I even missed one of my solos!

I think that, seeing as I don't have very many dreams, my few dreams are triggered by my subconcious fears while sleeping. I often wake up to some sort of music which ends up being my alarm. My alarm is usually going off about a half hour after I set it when I wanted to wake up. My dreams must know somehow that I am not waking up and they try to make me know that it's time. This usually just comes across as a dream that seems like I'm really awake.

When I was much younger I would sit around with my cousins on holidays and talk about the weirdest dreams that all of us had ever had. Dreams are really quite fascinating things, especially the very realistic variety. I wonder if I somehow ruined my ability to have normal dreams through this constant discussion of the subject...

My Favorite Tall Tale

I really enjoy the tall tale of John Henry vs. the Steam Hammer. It is a tale about the will of man to overcome any obstacles that he may be faced with. If you have forgotten this story, here is a brief summary. John Henry was a steel driver working on a railroad. He was the best that there ever was. One day, he was challenged to a competition against a new technology, the steam hammer. The challenge entailed driving a tunnel through a mountain. The two parties battled neck and neck until the very end where John Henry pulled ahead and won. As soon as he finished, John Henry laid down and died. This story has great moral values. It teaches you to never give up. It also teaches to importance of striving for your goals. Also, it shows a sign of the times. The steam hammer represents a new technology, a new invention that would soon put many workers out of their jobs. John Henry, possibly seen as a representative of all railroad workers of the time, showed the necessary will needed for these people to keep their jobs.

I find this story interesting to the ridiculousness of how tall the tale really is. There's no way that one man could bore a hole clear through a mountain. However, the fact that it isn't very realistic helps one to see the characters as the symbols that they are meant to be rather than real people. Also, tied in with the ridiculous factor is a sense of realism. The steam hammer was a real thing that could indeed do this deed. This helped to show just how big of a task John Henry was completing.

This tall tale is just incredibly epic. I love it mainly for that simple reason. A no holds barred showdown of the ages. I also love how it has been skewed over time. John Henry was a real person, and he was indeed quite strong, but he couldn't dig through a mountain. One of my friends, Jace Vaninger, is someone who I would write a tall tale about. He is a legitimate legend. He founded one of the greatest indoor soccer teams known to man, the Mighty Fighty Whale Sharks. What else is there to say?

Vengeance

I don't really think that I'm a person who needs revenge. This is mainly due to that fact that people don't really do anything to mess with me in a serious sense. Talking about vengeance really just reminds me of a famous Bill Cosby comedy routine called "Revenge." It's one of the funniest routines that I have ever heard. In his routine he tells a story from his childhood about a kid named Jr. Barnes who hit him in the head with a "slush ball" in a snowball fight. That was the number one rule about snowball fights: NO SLUSH BALLS. After this event transpired, Cosby began plotting his revenge. It was a long plotting process. In his plan, he befriended Jr. Barnes and slowly gained his trust. For several months he waited. All the while he had been saving a perfectly formed snow ball in his freezer. July came around, and Cosby decided that it was the day that he would have his revenge, his birthday. He had Jr. Barnes on his porch, and he went in to get a soda. He looked in the freezer for his snow ball, but it was not there. Thus, he went out and spit on Jr. Barnes.

This story is just such a hilarious portrayal of vengeance. Vengeance isn't actually a laughing matter, though. And THAT is why it's so funny. Cosby takes matters that aren't traditionally funny and makes them incredibly hilarious. It truly is a real talent.

Even if anyone went out of their way to be mean or cruel to me, I would not feel the need to seek revenge against them. My of revenge would just be to not talk to them as often as I do other people. I would do this because they would obviously be someone who wouldn't want to talk to me. If they were nice to me, I could probably find it in my heart to forgive them. I like to think that I'm usually pretty nice to people until they aren't nice to me.

My Biggest Fear

Really, lots of things scare me. I think my biggest fear is forgetting something really important. I do this a lot, though. This can be as simple as forgetting my calculator for math class, or as big as, I don't know, say, forgetting my instrument for some big band competition. Okay, I've never done anything THAT drastic, but I have forgotten my instrument at times that we were supposed to play. I hate forgetting my book for class. It's one of the worst feelings ever. I'm really scared of the walk of shame while getting up to ask a teacher if you can go to your locker to get the book. Mrs. Williams, who I love as a teacher, scares me to death when I forget something. She has a way of turning the usual, "Go get it," into something that makes you feel extremely guilty for what you have done, a seemingly innocent slip up. To cope with this fear, I usually just pretend that she's being sarcastic. I laugh it off and go on with my day. She can be a sarcastic person, so this is a somewhat fitting lie to myself.

I think that the absolute worst thing that I have ever forgotten was a project for driver's ed freshman year. It was a big project, but I just completely forgot about it until 5:30 the morning that it was due. I scrambled to finish it in the morning, but it was just too big of a project. I ended up failing it and getting a C for the first quarter the class. However, I really worked hard the next during the next quarter. Somehow, through a stroke of great work habits and organization, I pulled off a 117% for the second quarter. Then, I aced the final. Somehow, my semester grade came out as an A. I was very surprised. That one forgotten project led to all of the unnecessary extra work that I had to do, and this has helped to shape my fear of forgetfulness.