Just to start with, forgive me if this review is a bit abridged. I wrote a whole big thing on this book then lost the file before I could get it online. So it’s a little depressing to do it all again. Regardless, onto the review.
The Red Badge of Courage is considered by many to be the first modern war novel. It was written in 1865, and accounts the tale of one Henry Flemming, or The Youth as he more often referred to. The Youth is an infantryman in the Union army during the American Civil War. He starts out with these glorious ideas about valor and heroism but ends up facing first hand some of the grimmer more morbid realities of modern conflict. His tale is as interesting as it is introspective. Most of the narrative comes directly in the form of Henry’s thoughts and emotions. We come to sympathize and understand his fear, his rage, and his confusions about the battle which spans the novel, and the war in general. Not to say that this is a book really all that concerned with the Civil War. In fact, I think this book is regarded so highly to this day is that it doesn’t just concentrate on this specific unnamed battle or that war; but uses the specifics to draw a larger picture of what battle means to people. It is an honest psychological study, that gives insight into a complex phenomenon.
What I liked about The Red Badge of Courage was its honesty. The Youth is both terrified, and fantastically brave at once. His dichotomy of emotions showed me what I think a war might really feel like to the grunts. It is a very raw novel, surprising for something written so long ago, but I think the brilliance of it stands because things aren’t really that different today then they were 180 years ago. The book is short and to the point although it didn’t feel rushed at all. I thought the flow of time in the novel was, very realistic actually. They spend hours just sitting around waiting, thinking, analyzing motivations.
What I didn’t like about the book was the lengths to which it went. It reminded me quite a lot of The Thin Red Line (the film only, I haven’t read the book). But that too, was a very personal introspective look at war. The problem with that story, as with this is that it goes just a step too far. I care about psychology and motives as much as the next guy, but the characters loose something by over thinking everything. I know that times, especially being in a place like Henry, must be confusing but he frets literally about everything. Doubts are healthy, to an extent, but I’ve got to think that there comes a point where it’s too much. And even if the character is unproductively overanalyzing his life, I don’t think the reader wants to necessarily go along with him all the time. I guess I just felt like the story became bogged down by Henry’s neurosis.
At the end of the day, The Red Badge of Courage was a pretty good book. It’s an interesting look at an intense psychological state that most people hopefully will never have to experience. I liked the raw emotion, and even some of the neurotic tendencies. I’d say this one’s worth the time.
