Analyze the differing attitudes to Henry Fleming communicated by the storyteller during the class of the ruddy badge of bravery and conclude by specifying what you see as the storyteller ‘s concluding position of him.
‘The Red Badge of Courage ‘ is a authoritative male bildungsroman – the rite of transition of a immature adult male from artlessness to see. For coevalss of work forces throughout history, war has provided the landscape for this sloughing of vernal promise, and Ascension to adulthood. Literature has frequently strived to picture this – from Sophocles ‘ Oedipus through Shakespeare ‘s ‘Henry IV ‘ through the poesy of the First World War and past Jennifer Johnston ‘s ‘How Many Miles to Babylon ‘ .
In the opening exchange of ‘The Red Badge of Courage ‘ , Henry Fleming is placed at the threshold of combat – a topographic point of self-contemplation and contemplation ; a clip to contemplate his yesteryear, his present and his hereafter. The human arrested development, so the natural call, to violently support one ‘s ain is something that has been with Fleming from his early yearss –“ he had, of class, dreamed of conflicts all his life – of vague and bloody struggles that had thrilled him with their expanse and fire. ”The gallantry that is associated with military victory, and the historical resonance that war necessarily provides in footings of determining future coevalss, is a judicious drug for a immature adult male. Isolating a sense of victory from the overall sense of war is unnervingly easy for those that have become inadvertently intoxicated by its spirits.
The degree of his initial naivete is displayed in the fortunes that precede his recruitment. His apprehension of war is confined to the pages of history books and newspapers ; the romanticism of “ heavy Crowns and high palaces ” and the day-to-day studies of a “ decisive triumph ” . The geographical and experiential distance between a immature farm male child and the war that was supplying “ the chitchat of the small town ” was such that Fleming could non assist but go fixated with recruitment, if merely to detect the truth – and disregard his sense of“ distrust… ( that it was ) some kind of drama matter. ”Indeed, the images that Fleming has in his head are ‘playful ‘ –“ his busy head had drawn for him big images extravagant in colour, lurid with dyspneic workss. ”His imaginings do non compare with world as they are the sum parts of his ain bare reading of reported events. His firsthand contact with war is non-existent. Everything is strictly an imagining. The yoke of such a wonder and a unusual sense of male intent – be that purpose selfish or altruistic – provide the tweezers that escort the willing Fleming into the armed forces.
His female parent, meanwhile, has a more practical appropriation of war. She sees it as something that has inevitable power over her boy, and allows him his ain sense of fate. But her cryings that accompany the intelligence of her boy ‘s recruitment are the consequence of a existent emotion – of existent cognition – that pay the regard to the worlds of war that her boy knows nil approximately. On go forthing his “ quaking ” female parent, Henry“ bowed his caput, experiencing all of a sudden ashamed of his intents. ”The ‘purposes ‘ are non merely war, and the barbarous blood-letting of combat, or the sense of accomplishment or brotherhood, or nationalism, or possible gallantry, but to turn into an grownup – to do his ain determinations.
The impressionability of young person is once more exposed when Henry“ felt the gulf now between them ( his classmates ) and… swelled with unagitated pride ”This unagitated pride would give manner to an eventual storm that Henry would non be able to prosecute in or even fathom at this occasion. Alternatively, he “ strutted ” towards war. But non in assurance ; in ignorance.
As a young person, Fleming has been sheltered. His experiences have been simple and toothsome: “ In his life he had taken things for granted, ne’er challenged his belief in ultimate success, and trouble oneselfing small about agencies and roads ” . The inquiries that occupy Fleming ‘the soldier ‘ are 1s of uncertainty:“ It had all of a sudden appeared to him that possibly in a conflict he might run. ”Furthermore, he concludes that“ … every bit far as he was concerned he knew nil of himself. ”This is a immature adult male who is coercing himself to face his ain intent, his ain makeup ; this is a immature adult male seeking for something. His battle in the hereafter, and in his ain destiny, is absolute ; a adult male who is seeing through his ain eyes for perchance the first clip,“ …and in the shadow of the at hand uproar he suspected them ( “ his…recalled visions of broken-bladed glorification ” ) to be impossible images. ”
The chance of conflict provides Fleming with the ultimate chance for self-knowledge. He understands“ that the lone manner to turn out himself was to travel into the blazing, and so figuratively to watch his legs to detect his virtues and mistakes. ”To turn out himself has become less a inquiry of belonging within his equals, but more a inquiry of belonging within his ain appraisal of himself – he seeks to justify his ain inherent aptitude to inscribe. And all the piece, he is incapacitated by diffidence and neurotic second-guessing.“ His emotions made him experience strange in the presence of work forces who talked excitedly of a prospective conflict as of a play they were approximately to witness, with nil but avidity and wonder in their faces. It was frequently that he suspected them to be prevaricators. ”At this point, Fleming makes the differentiation between being ensconced in the physical personal menace of a conflict and the comparative safety of detecting same conflict ; a differentiation that he seemed incapable of before enlisting.
The chance of combat looms over Henry like a circling hawk or “ a row of firedrakes ” . He talks of a “ mysterious somberness ” , and the unknown sphere of conflict continues to supply a unusual fantastical quality in his head ; still his artlessness continues to permeate the baleful battlefield. The act of waiting – of physically and mentally fixing for conflict – provides Henry with an uneasy sense of fulfillment. He finds no consolation in his fellow soldiers and finds differentiations between his ain mental preoccupations and theirs. When confronted with a immature miss wrestle for control of her Equus caballus, he observes the other soldiers become embroiled in the release of the simple play, while he“ would hold sacrificed all the brass buttons on the continent to hold been enabled to return to them ( milking responsibilities ) . He told himself that he was non formed for a soldier. ”and more than that… it occurred to him that he had ne’er wished to come to the war. He had non enlisted of his free will. He had been dragged by the unmerciful authorities. ”Whether this was something that he had subconsciously known from the beginning, it was merely when placed in the world of the minute that he gained lucidity on his ‘decision ‘ .
Throughout his service Fleming wrestlings with his ain dreamer inherent aptitudes and the sense of responsibility that is portion and package of being a soldier:“ one time he thought he had concluded that it would be better to acquire killed straight and stop his problems ”. He views decease as a topographic point “ where he would be understood. ” Once his ain position as a soldier is slightly reinforced by the determination of the loud soldier to take Fleming as the Jesus of his personal contents to his household, his fraternal bond to his regiment strengthens. When the group are placed in ‘crisis ‘ , Fleming“ …suddenly lost concern for himself, and forgot to look at a menacing destiny. He became non a adult male but a member. ”The integrity of the work forces is cast non in a shared intent every bit much as a shared destiny, ‘born of the fume and danger of decease. ‘ The initial victory leaves him with ‘the most delicious esthesiss of his life ‘ , confering upon himself a sense of accomplishment and pride that he had hoped to detect in himself as a fledgling to the war, but felt unsure genuinely lived within him. But the grim nature of war rapidly deposits him back in the unsure minutes of combat, which merely serves as a reminder of his impractical apprehension of the length of service of his soldier ‘s destiny. The changeless military motions and brushs vouching that a “ …scowl of chagrin and fury ” were the fixture of his facial looks as his regiment became more and more low.
The position of the work forces is on a regular basis reduced to that of kids. Men weep, or babble incoherently like babes. Fleming can non assist but recognize that war reduces everyone to their newborn provinces. And yet for him, he believed it to supply the manner for him to release his young person and go a adult male. Apparently, the credence that adult male is both kid and grownup is the true reaching at maturity:“ The drift of enthusiasm was theirs again… And they were work forces. ”
By the terminal of the novel, Fleming is prepared for decease. Indeed, at times he actively welcomes it as a manner of exposing his committedness to the cause, and to eliminate the hurting of past failures:“ Some pointers of contempt had buried themselves in his bosom had buried themselves in his bosom had generated unusual and indefinable hatred. It was clear to him that his concluding and absolute retaliation was to be achieved by his dead organic structure prevarication, lacerate and gluttering, upon the field. ”But beyond facing decease as simply the terminal of opposition, Fleming starts to see it as something non to fear as he strives to finish his service“ … he knew that he thought of the slugs as the things that could forestall him from making the topographic point of his enterprise. There were elusive flashes of joy within him that therefore should be his head. ”He joins the battleground as if it is steadfast land, either as his chosen burial land, or the terrain for his military success.
As Fleming considers his service, he is able to decide his successes and failures as he yearns for the simple pleasances of his young person, and his psyche alterations. He has arrived at the point of manhood that was fabled:“ He felt a quiet manhood… He was a adult male. ”Such contact with his ain mortality, and the mortality of others, has provided him with the replies that had peppered his vernal wonder. The inexorable world of his experiences has banished the infantile phantasy and love affair of war – and standing before us at the terminal of the novel is a immature adult male with history, with cognition, with unity and with pride.
