The Pressure of Socialization: Henry Fleming’s Warfare in The Red Badge of Courage

Abstract

Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage deals with Henry Fleming’s wartime experiences in which he imagines becoming a man and a hero through his courageous deeds. The meaning of courage is the primary focus, yet a simple analysis of courageous behavior seems to ignore the more important issues of socialization and gender roles, for Henry is on the verge of socialization to enter the realm of adult males. Wartime circumstances and his lessons from books and school instigate Henry to join the war and prove his manliness, thus being accepted as a grown man. Henry’s war is carried out in symbolic and real levels. His invisible yet tangible fight against his mother’s control is the battle between a boy’s desire for manliness and a mother’s discouragement of such desire. Henry’s leaving home suggests the victory of a boy’s desire for manliness. Another war Henry has to undergo is the army’s depersonalizing, dehumanizing force that will reduce him and his fellow soldiers to a non-human, animal-like status for the effective manipulation of manpower. Such unjust treatment from the army provokes Henry’s anger and hatred and he fights wildly. His fierce fighting suggests the absurdity of human behavior, whatever its motivation might be. It comes from both the explicit and implicit pressure of socialization, and this absurdity is Crane’s message.