I like the Pagan --> Christian --> Modern formulation. But I'd add that Crane was one of the standard-bearers for literary naturalism, which was itself heavily influenced by Darwinism. Not all modernists were naturalists, but quite a few were. Those who were did not buy into the supremacy of the individual at all. In fact, they believed (as M.H. Abrams memorably put it) that the individual was the victim of "glandular secretions within and sociological pressures without." London's "South of the Slot" shows this beautifully in the character of Freddie Drummond, who morphs into Big Bill Totts quite involuntarily. So I think understanding RED BADGE or "The Open Boat" requires some attention to the Darwinian idea of the individual not as a self-made survivor, but as the product of chance -- helpless in the face of the massive biological and economic forces in the world.
I read this novel The Red Badge of Courage and taught it long ago. You take me back with this insightful essay. Oddly, what you've written makes me think of this poem by Bill Matthews, much loved poet who died young:
Meticulous
"I have passed the age of boredom and I left part of myself with
I like the Pagan --> Christian --> Modern formulation. But I'd add that Crane was one of the standard-bearers for literary naturalism, which was itself heavily influenced by Darwinism. Not all modernists were naturalists, but quite a few were. Those who were did not buy into the supremacy of the individual at all. In fact, they believed (as M.H. Abrams memorably put it) that the individual was the victim of "glandular secretions within and sociological pressures without." London's "South of the Slot" shows this beautifully in the character of Freddie Drummond, who morphs into Big Bill Totts quite involuntarily. So I think understanding RED BADGE or "The Open Boat" requires some attention to the Darwinian idea of the individual not as a self-made survivor, but as the product of chance -- helpless in the face of the massive biological and economic forces in the world.
I read this novel The Red Badge of Courage and taught it long ago. You take me back with this insightful essay. Oddly, what you've written makes me think of this poem by Bill Matthews, much loved poet who died young:
Meticulous
"I have passed the age of boredom and I left part of myself with
it."--Flaubert
The blare of blank paper: the solace
of making lists, tracking fresh snow.
The list grows. How busy I must be.
To have planned a day is almost
to have lived it. HERE, I stab it
again, where I crossed out a near
disaster, and I let my voice
trail off, three dots, the last bootprints . . .
What became of him, I wonder,
rapt and lost, who was almost me?
Fantastic.