The Red Badge of Courage

First published in 1895, this Civil War novel follows Henry Fleming, a young private in a New York volunteer regiment facing its first battle in Virginia. He imagines a Homeric wound, then panics in the smoke and runs. Shame, rumours, and a blow to the head send him back toward the lines, where he must live among men who did not flee. The narrative stays close to his sensations: noise, thirst, and the suddenness of dying. Officers and unnamed companions appear without a wide map of the campaign. The book is a psychological battle story, not a biography of a historical soldier.

Bound in grey cloth blocked with a dark blue pattern. White dust-jacket printed in red and black.