0:02 Who are you and where are you going? What do you want? [Music] Hello and welcome to Jigger's place. So, I'm laughing because it's always this the struggle to change the the uh the image um without you seeing my fingers. I still haven't quite figured out how to do that, but may maybe one
0:38 day. Anyway, thanks for joining me uh this afternoon or evening if you're on the East Coast. I'm I'm Kevin Bemel, your host. And here at Jiggers's Place, we relax as we head into the end of the week. We have a cocktail or two. And today we're going to be talking about uh an absolutely outstanding book uh The Red Badge of Courage by Steven Crane. So it was a revolutionary novel in its day. Uh it it it still really stands as a trends setter uh in
1:13 in American literature. And and in honor of our discussion of the red badge of courage, I'm going to make a cocktail that my cocktail designing assistant chat GPT and I made up called the red badge. Now, for those of you who are familiar with cocktail culture, you may recognize this is kind of a play on a a classic cocktail called a Manhattan. Um, a Manhattan is usually made with scotch um and sweet vermouth. Um, this is we're going to make this with bourbon. Bourbon
1:49 is is much more of a an American uh liquor. And um the recipe recommends a high rye liquor. I mean a high rye bourbon. What that means is so in order for something to be bourbon, it has to be made with at least 51% uh corn mash. Okay? Which is why bourbon tends to have a sweetness to it because corn um is is a is sweet. That's why corn syrup is used to sweeten things like uh like soft drinks. So um this is a bullet bourbon. Um, and it even says
2:25 here, made using our family's high ry mash bill mash bill and pure Kentucky limestone filtered water. So, this is a just a a workhorse of a bourbon. Uh and and uh but but so the reason so rye as as opposed to corn which is sweet rye tends to be spicy in the s in the sense of not hot but in the sense of it brings out flavors like cinnamon and clove and those kind of things. Rye is um my my favorite whiskey. Um and and just as a
3:01 note here my my Oh no, I'm sorry. I take that back. I have it in the library. in the library. I have a uh decanter of uh rye whiskey and it's bullet rye. Um my my favorite just everyday uh rye whiskey. So then uh the other ingredients are we're going to use Luxardo bitter russo. You can see it's got a lovely red color. And then um we're going to use herring cherry lur. Okay. and a little bit of sweet
3:38 vermouth, which is also red, and a couple of dashes of good old Angistero bitters. So, so I've got my mixing glass with ice in it, and we're going to start out with 2 oz of bourbon. There we go. Now, you know, some cocktail mixers, they're really really careful about exact measurements. I am not. Okay. Um, you know, it's
4:13 I I like mixing cocktails, but uh it it's just, you know, you got to kind of do your own thing. Okay, that's right. There we go. Then 3/4 of an ounce of uh the Lxardo bitter ruso. Okay, which is what's going to distinguish it from a Manhattan that there's bitters in it. Okay. And then uh let's see, a half ounce of herring cherry. This is a classic classic cherry lur. One of the best. Also happens to be
4:48 kosher. And a bar spoon of vermouth. Okay, which means just a little bit of vermouth. Sweet vermouth. Okay, put the bar spoon in there anyway because we're going to be stirring it in a moment. Okay, and we're going to put in a couple of dashes of Angstero bitters. One, two. Okay, and now we're going to stir. And as I always mention when we make cocktails, the purpose of the stirring is not just
5:25 to mix the ingredients, but it's also to uh melt some of the ice because the water brings out the flavors. Okay. So, we want to mix for a good 20 to 30 seconds. And if you saw the show two weeks ago, I had a shaker. I managed to fling I forgot to put the cap on the shaker, I think, or it came off and I had cocktail all over the place, but uh we got through it. So, a little bit more. You can see this if if you can see this has kind of a sang gray color. Sang gray
6:01 bean blood, which of course is appropriate. The red badge of courage refers to the blood of of the Civil War. Okay, that looks pretty good. We'll get our stringer out. Oh, you know what? I forgot to get a glass. And you want a coop. So, coupe. And we're going to pour this in.
6:38 And then we're going to garnish it with a an orange peel. Kind of express a little bit of the there. And then drop it in. Okay. And here we go. Now, you know, I'll tell you, I'm not a big Manhattan fan, but and so if you're not a big Manhattan fan, try this. This is I I like this much better than a Manhattan. Okay, I'll see you over on the sofa.
7:39 So, here we are. It's uh it's Thursday afternoon here in Los Angeles, a little after 5:00. And uh as we move across the country, right, time zone 6 7 8:00 p.m. on the East Coast, we've got our cocktail. H. So, I don't know about you, but uh these these long summer days, if you're doing stuff outside, they're great. But, uh otherwise, I feel like I
8:14 need to still be working as long as it's daylight out, which these days it's daylight out until 8:00 and uh you know, so uh but that's the way it is. So, um this is the com this is the copy of the red badge of courage that I have. Um this is this was published by Barnes & Noble. Um they did a they they do a whole series of uh classic books of you know classic literature. Um and they all have a similar format on the cover. You can see it's a short book. So less than
8:50 200 pages as I recall. Yes. Uhhuh. It's 83 pages and you can see it's it's a large large type. So, uh the the the book is uh it's really more of a novella than a novel. A novella being kind of a short novel. Uh and I I read it many I mean decades ago now. Uh it is it is a wonderful book and not just for for boys. Um although certainly for me as a teenager which was when I read it um it
9:26 it it was a a lot different than reading it as you know an adult. The the adventure of it the pathos of it uh resonated with me I think much more as a as a as a teen um whereas the the the depth of the story and the ideas that it brings forth much more powerful as an adult. So before I I talk about uh the book itself, I want to talk a little bit about its author uh Stephen Crane. So I I have a kind of a short biography of Stephven
10:03 Crane. Um he was uh born in 1871. So it was already uh six years after this civil war had ended in 1865. And he was born in New York, New Jersey. He was, get this, the 14th child of a Methodist minister. Wow. Big big family, right? Uh he was an American novelist, short story writer, and journalist. He attended Lafayette College in Syracuse University. Um but he left uh before
10:38 graduating from Syracuse to pursue journalism um in New York City uh where he lived in poverty while he developed his craft of writing. Uh remarkably he wrote the red badge of courage when he was 24. Okay. So it was written in um 1895. Okay. and um he had never experienced combat himself. So I'm sure he had talked to Civil War veterans, heard their stories, that sort
11:15 of thing. And as a reporter though uh he he did not have firthand experience but uh when you read the book you will see uh what an uh outstanding ability Stephven Crane had to take what he was told and turn into an extraordinarily compelling story. uh and uh he was associated with the naturalist and the and the um and the realist movements in American literature which I'll talk about in a minute and uh
11:51 and um uh sadly he died when he was just 28 years old in 1900. So he died a very young man. He died of tuberculosis which was was not particularly uncommon uh in the in the uh n 19th century. Uh and um despite that um he he published several major works. I'm going to give you the names of some of them. So his first novel was called Maggie, a girl of the streets.
12:27 was published in 1893 and it talked about the life of a young uh woman in New York slums. Um it was initially self-published. It was um one of the first American novels to realistically portray poverty and prostitution. Then of course he wrote um The Red Badge of Courage in 1895. In 1897, he wrote what is usually considered his best short story, The Open Boat. Um, based on his own experience surviving a shipwreck. Uh, in 1898, he wrote The
13:03 Blue Hotel, also a short story. Um, it examined violence and paranoia in the American West. Um, and it's noted for its its psychological depth and moral ambiguity. um something that kind of preaged um the the sort of film noir uh phenomenon that began you know arguably in the 1940s. Um he wrote um uh quite a bit of war poetry. Um he was quite innovative in free verse u following in the footsteps
13:38 of Walt Whittmann. He wrote The Black Writers in 1895, which was a stark symbolic poem that that was kind of a bridge between the more lyrical style of Walt Whittmann and the more contemporary modernist poetry. And then of course, as I mentioned, he was a journalist. Um, he covered conflicts including the Greco Turkish War and the Spanishame War. So uh uh Steven Crane is associated with two literary movements. The first one
14:13 being realism which emerged in the mid 19th century and it was it was really a reaction to the sort of romantic idealism um that was that was prevalent in literature. So realist writers as the name implies sought to depict uh life as it actually was. Okay. So it didn't gloss over or paint a you know a happy it didn't paint a a polyianish view of life. rather it it was stark trying to convey to people you know what
14:50 was really going on for other people especially other classes of people with whom they would not have been uh familiar. So um he focused on ordinary people. It the realist movement I should say focused on ordinary people rather than the sort of historic uh situations and it it emphasized being accurate in the in observing u social condition social conditions psychological complexity and authentic dialogue. and and there were a number of major American realists including two of my
15:26 favorite authors authors William Dean Howells and Henry James. Uh and I'm currently reading um Portrait of a Lady by Henry James. Uh a a wonderful book um about a young woman born in America um ends up inheriting money from her uh father who uh I'm sorry from her uncle. I believe it is actually her uncle who uh was an American but living an expatriate living in England. So, so uh Steven Crane was uh part of the realist movement. He was also part of the um
16:03 naturalism movement which was really kind of an extension of realism that developed in the latter part of the 19th century. And it was it was influenced by the um scientific thinking and theories of among others Darwin. So um naturalistic writers viewed humans as sort of a subject to natural forces, heredity, environment um often portraying them as victims of circumstances beyond their control. So uh unlike a perhaps a more sort of god-
16:40 centered way of of pre of presenting life or a deterministic way of pre presenting life where you know people are the determiners of of their own existence or in the in the in the in the former that you know God controls the world and so you know everything happens by a plan. Um, but we're not really, you know, the the the the sort of play things of nature. The naturalism movement is is, you know, much more of the idea that natural forces that are beyond human
17:16 control. They have a big impact on human lives to and and and humans are essentially powerless to uh to control or counteract these natural forces. So um they employed scientific observation methods very much in line with uh Charles Darwin who of course is famous for the um uh for the theory of evolution. Okay. And they they often focused on kind of the darker aspects of human existence. So um key figures in the in
17:54 the naturalistic movement include Emil Zola in France. Um, I I honestly have not read any of Zola's work. Um, and Theodore Dryer in America. And again, I haven't read any of Dricer's works either. Uh, to be honest, I'm not a big fan of the of books on the dark side. I think Kofka Kofka wasn't a naturalist. Uh but um he he he does kind of focus on the dark side of life, but uh in in a way that is more sort of almost science fictionist with a with a twist. That's
18:29 that's that's about as dark as I can go. Although one day I will have to pick up Zola and Derer and read them. So uh uh Stephven Crane really kind of occupied a unique position between these two movements. He was part of what drove the the the shift from one to another and beyond. And he had a tremendous impact uh on American literature. So, uh so I'm I'm going to talk about um some of those impacts and then and those are really going to be the the basis for why I
19:07 think it's important for you to read the red badge of courage. I have to fortify myself here for a moment. Okay. So, um first of all, um Crane really pioneered the sort of psychological realism um that became a hallmark of early to mid 20th century literature. So
19:43 um he he um really looked at the sort of internal psychological processes particularly when a character was under stress. And his idea was to reveal the the the the character of a character by you know sort of stream of consciousness expression and and and a sort of an inner monologue that that the character was having. So um writers who were influenced by this
20:19 aspect of crane um include um Ernest Hemingway who whose writing is to my mind brilliant whether it's the old man in the sea or for whom the bell tolls um uh the sun also rises these are all wonderful wonderful books uh and uh let's see I think it's uh for whom the bell Poles is I I believe is his book that's set during the Spanish Civil War. So you can see that um both were writing um you know on war themes.
20:54 Um and William Faulner um who of course is is also brilliant. As I lay dying um being one of his his his best known uh novels. So uh this sort of psychological realism is is is is something that uh Steven Crane pioneered. Um he also was uh developed the idea of impressionistic pros where um he revealed information through the the sensory impressions and the subjective pe uh experiences of his
21:29 characters. you know, uh, rather than sort of traditional narrative exposition where the author kind of tells you what someone may be feeling or or explains to you the inner struggle that a character may be going through. um impressionistic pros really you you learn about those internal aspects of a character through how they talk and how they express themselves. Okay? So you're getting an impression of the character
22:05 from the character himself rather than through the sort of you know omnisient uh you know author who stands apart from the characters in the book. Um Crane also kind of established the the template for modern war um literature. So um he emphasized the psychological over the historic aspects of war and um you know again he he he influenced Hemingway in his war novels as well well
22:42 as Norman Mor's the naked and the dead and Tim O'Brien's Vietnam war stories. So uh whereas if you look at um uh you know war in peace which is this you know um Toltoy Leo Toltoy's you know grandiose um you know to not tome too but but explanation of war and as this you know historic I mean heroic uh thing. Well, actually, that's probably
23:19 not so much the case, but but uh more along the Well, so so um uh Patrick O'Brien, for example, in uh in in many of his books, whether it's the uh um uh going up on the uh the um gosh, Mastering Commander, the the the famous uh sea novels, very heroic characters. Same with the herrational hornblower books by by Foster. These
23:54 this is portraying war in a in a heroic way. So um Steven Crane was more he he really wanted to depict war and its impact on the soldiers the people who fought and the kind of psychological uh um uh impact and and and typically not positive impact it had on the characters. Okay. Um he often he also uh his books sort of pioneered urban realism kind of you know um uh in sort
24:32 of the vein of Charles Dickens who you know so many of his novels were were designed to uh bring to light the challenges of the urban poor in London whether it's uh Oliver Twist or or little Dorit. Um, all of so many of Charles Dickens's books were designed to move the middle and upper classes to understand the struggles of the lower class. Uh, and and he did so in a very
25:08 realistic way. Okay. And and there are other aspects, but those are those are sort of, you know, some of the main main ones. So, um, another little sip. Um, the the the fact of the matter is that despite um dying at a very young age, 28 years old, Stephen Crane was really at a significant pivot point in American literature.
25:43 And I'm not going to go so far as to say American literature wouldn't be today what it is without Steven Crane, but his books and and and The Red Badge of Courage is far and away his most well-known book had it it's it's pretty difficult to understate the impact that it had on how American literature developed. So, why should you read the red badge of courage? Right? This is where the we're going to talk takas here as we say in Yiddish. Where the rubber
26:18 hits the road, right? So, I came up with eight reasons why you should read the red badge of courage. Okay? And then I'll add on a ninth. Uh first of all, it's it is a revolutionary war narrative. Not revolutionary in the sense of the American Revolution. revolutionary in the in the way that it changed how war was depicted in literature. So I mentioned that already. Um it was one of the first novels to depict war from a psychological rather than a historic perspective and it showed the internal
26:54 struggle that a soldier grappling with fear and and moral conflict dealt with rather than glorifying battle. Okay. And and I was having this conversation with a friend of mine uh uh earlier today and we were talking about how how war has changed over the centuries and how in many ways fighting in a war was a right of passage for young men. Uh and and until relatively, you know, recent times,
27:32 uh you know, armies like they they lined up, you know, in front of each other and they shot arrows at each other or they fired uh musketss and rifles at each other and you're you're you're you know, you're standing there kind of on a on a field not not so far away from the enemy. And to do that really took a lot of intestinal fortitude, right? And then uh you know obviously through um wars like the French and Indian War, the American Revolution and then on into the uh
28:09 uh um you know and then on through the rest of the 19th century and into you know the development the development of modern war during the Bore War, the the SpanishAmerican War and on into World War I, World War II. Obviously that that changed uh that that completely changed. So um so too did the way novelist dealt with war. And it went from being this sort of heroic right of passage of manhood to an examination of
28:45 uh what a soldier has to go through to to to be a part of a war. So um he so that's one reason you you you should read it so you you can understand the nature of this most destructive of human conflicts. Uh that's number one. Number two uh Crane really was using pioneering literary techniques. I talk about his I talked about his realism his naturalism. So these these really crane was really a part of the development of American literature
29:23 and you would be hardpressed to understand how American literature changed from the 19th to the 20th century uh without reading the red badge of courage and and and getting an actual sense of what these literary movements were all about. So that's that's number two. Number three, it is a timeless uh exploration of courage. So the novel or novella really it it examines what courage truly is. So so often we you
30:02 know we associate courage especially in in fiction with sort of a reckless sense of bravery. Certainly when you you look at um uh Sir Walter Scott, whether it's Ivanho or or his other wonderful nom look, they're they're they're absolutely delightful to read, but there's a certain recklessness in the chivalri chivalri uh uh descriptions of courage that you see. Uh and Crane was really dealing with the kind of inner bravery
30:37 somebody needs to have to do something to do something that means they have to overcome their fear. So it's a much more it's a much deeper uh psychological examination of courage. And for those of you who have ever gotten an email from me, you you see that I I sign my emails courage at all times. And the reason I I sign my email emails that way is it is extremely difficult to be courageous.
31:13 It's actually easier, I think, to be physically brave than it is to be morally courageous. And so I think we all need just that reminder that you know we we we need to be we need to exhibit courage. We need to exhibit uh the ability to cleave to our moral code. Okay. Next uh he really it's the the red badge of courage is just a masterful example of psychological realism. the kind of inner dialogues that uh Crane's portrayal of of Henry,
31:49 who's the the main character in the book, um that he deals with the self-doubt, the rationalizations, they they I think you're going to find that they feel very relevant and contemporary because Crane was writing about the human condition. So the fact that he wrote the book now almostund well yeah o uh yeah over 150 years ago no I'm sorry 1895 so 130 years ago uh you know it still has a very modern
32:24 feel to it and and this is important because the I think one of the reasons for reading literature is to give is to help us build our sense of humility. Okay, we it's easy to think that because we have at our command such tremendous technology, relatively speaking, you know, at least you know country nationwide tremendous amount of wealth uh that somehow we are the sort of titans of all time and and that's that
33:00 is not the case. Uh there's an argument to be made that in in some ways um we are diminished uh from our forebears and and so to keep our our sense of humility about us um is is very important and and literature can help us do that when we see the timelessness of it. Okay. Um, next is the you know even though it's it's a novella it's short like I said this this printing of
33:36 it is less than 200 pages with large type. So and yet it is enormously impactful. So, you know, whereas I mentioned Leo Toltoy's book um uh War and Peace, it's like over a thousand pages long, right? Uh arguably Stephven Crane packs into less than 200 pages as much impact as it took Toltoy a thousand pages to make. And uh I think we
34:11 uh we underestimate the power pardon me of brevity and and so uh the red badge of courage will help us uh remember that. Um next is uh the historical significance of the book. So although it's fiction, it has a it has a sense of non-fiction in the way it talks about the Civil War. So I just need to wet my whistle. So the Civil War
34:46 was really the most brutal war that America ever fought. It was literally in some cases brother against brother. And and so uh to read the red badge of courage is to understand the civil war in a different way than if you read for example the battlecry of freedom which is a a wonderful non-fiction uh his you know history of the civil war. Hey history is fantastic. Don't go me don't get me
35:22 wrong. I love history. I love reading about history, but history does not help us necessarily understand how individuals who actually experienced events felt. And this is the power of literature and especially a book like The Red Badge of Courage. It helps us create an empathetic connection between our forebears going through. It can be a monumental a monumentally
35:57 cataclysmic event like the civil war. It can be the interpersonal upheaval of the breakup of a relationship. Okay. And so that that's a reason to read literature in general, but the red badge of courage specifically. Okay. And then uh two more the the sort of well so just to again to understand the the influence on American literature that Stephven Crane had. So if you've read any of the uh leather stocking tales um I'm going up on the author's
36:32 name uh um Daniel Defoe who wrote in the late 18th century. They're wonderful, wonderful books. Nathaniel Hawthorne, the Scarlet Letter. Again, a wonderful book, but very, very different than Hemingway and Faulner who wrote in the first half of the 20th century. So, Stephven Crane helps you understand the transition from from uh uh Defoe and Hawthorne to Hemingway and uh Faulner.
37:09 Okay. So, and it's good to understand how that developed. Okay. And then the last of my eight reasons why you should read the red badge of courage is it is a universal coming of age story. So, setting aside the war setting and all of the internal conflict over bravery versus cowardice and and and and attempts to cleave to one's moral code. the the main character Henry in the red badge of courage. He is a a a young man
37:44 and it is through his experiences that are that are uh written about in the red badge of courage that he becomes a man. I mean that's the coming of age story uh that that is the red badge of courage and these are useful for us. They're useful for us as adults to un to to to interpret how we matured. They're useful for teenagers. This is this is not a book, by the way, for pre-teens, I I would argue, but for teenagers, high
38:19 school age, it it it's it's valuable for them to understand the process of coming of age. Okay. And from from that standpoint, uh, you know, in in our society today, the the impetuses for someone to mature and take on adult responsibilities, I think, have never been lower. So, you know, we we we try to delay adulthood uh for our children. uh we we
38:56 go to great lengths to do that. And while some of that is good, other parts of it are not, especially if it permanently retards their ability to mature and be able to take on life on its own terms. And so to read coming of of age stories and see how previous generations thought about this process is valuable for both teens, young adults, and old adults like me. So I promised you a bonus ninth reason why you should read The Red Badge of
39:33 Courage, and that is because it is just a great story. So, if you like reading great stories, you're not going to find a better one than The Red Badge of Courage. And so, there you go. A bonus reason to to read the book. So, my cocktail is done. My case is presented. I submit it to you, the jury. And it only remains for me to thank you for joining me. Uh, and if you have any
40:08 thoughts, all the links will be uh in the show notes when this episode posts on YouTube. If you uh enjoy the show, do me a favor and and and suggest it to a friend or family member. I'd really appreciate it is and and if they get something out of it that this show in particular is just an opportunity for us to really talk about what matters in life. Not that finances aren't important. Obviously they are. But relationships and personal growth
40:44 are really uh the the the the raison detra as the French say the reason for being of human existence. And so that's why I do this show. Plus, I get to have a cocktail. So, thank you so much for joining me uh here at Jiggers's Place. I wish you a wonderful rest of the week and a restorative weekend. And signing off as I always do. Marie Darling, you are my bell. Courage at all times, my friends.