written artwork - the red badge of courage

At this point in my reading list, I have come across several war stories.  And it is truly amazing how they differ.  All Quiet on The Western Front is pretty much completely depressing.  War & Peace is about the logistics and leaders of war.  Gone With The Wind is concerning the people left behind during war.  And now I come to The Red Badge of Courage.

This story is really more about the glory of war.  Our main character is young, and has joined the army int he civil war for the excitement and potential honor and glory to gain from it.  His first encounter with battle is scary, shocking, and embarrassing because he fleas.  As the story progresses, he learns to face his fears and becomes a soldier of great standing. 

It was an interesting perspective to see war from.  In our day, the atrocity of war is usually the main focus.  And while this book did tell of the awful outcomes of war, it decided to show, instead, the growth of one man because of war.  We view one boy become a man through hardship, but without the negativity normally associated with battle.

I will quickly mention that this book could pair well with Gone With The Wind.  They are both set during the Civil War, but from different sides (Union & Confederate) and are from the viewpoint of a soldier verses the viewpoint of the women left behind.  Very good comparison.

A list of what's to come, and what has already been explored.
My Written Artwork Journey Explained here

1. Animal Farm - George Orwell
2. The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. Emma - Jane Austen
4. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
5. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof - Tennessee Williams
6. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
7. Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde - Robert Louis Stevenson
8. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley
9. The Canterbury Tales - Geoffrey Chaucer
10. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
11. Nineteen Eighty-four - George Orwell
    
12. Death of a Salesman - Arthur Miller
13. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
14. The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorne
15. The Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
16. Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson
17. Pickwick Papers - Charles Dickens
18. Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
19. The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
20. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
21. Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison
22. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
23. Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut
24. The sun Also Rises - Ernest Hemingway
25. Their Eyes Were Watching God - Zora Neale Hurston
26. Things Fall Apart - Chinua Achebe
27. Love in the Time of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
28. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
29. Little Women - Louisa May Alcott
30. Crime and Punishment - Fedor Dostoyevsky
31. Watership Down - Richard Adams
32. Doctor Zhivago - Boris Pasternak
33. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
34. All Quiet on the Western Front - Erich Maria Remarque
35. Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
36. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
37. The Red Badge of Courage - Stephen Crane
38. Robinson Crusoe - Daniel Defoe
39. Tales - Edgar Allan Poe
40. Diary of a Madman and Other Stories - Nikolai Gogol
41. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
42. A Farewell To Arms - Ernest Hemingway
43. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen