Coming Of Age In The Red Badge Of Courage

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Dreams are one of the most important things to human beings. They keep people sane and give their life purpose. Dreams can range from owning a house in the suburbs with a wife and a white picket fence to being a multibillionaire. Everyone has their own version of the American Dream. However, sometimes these dreams are unachievable and the people who dreamt them were misguided in some way. Many failures of realizing dreams result in many young boys and girls. They’re minds are young and naïve enough to have preconceived notions of how some things work and how they ought to turn out. Their naivety is always countered by the harsh reality of growing up. This disappointment conversely, is not always a negative experience for young people.…show more content…
He was very immature and felt that conquering other people through battle would prove his manhood. His motive was not to fight for an important cause but to reach his own personal fame (Smith, Joyce. "Coming of age in The Red Badge of Courage."). This really pointed out the sense of childishness that was still very much a part of him even though he was a member of the army. Throughout his time in the army the foolish ideas he had about being a serviceman were mostly dominated by boredom. He was not participating in glorious battles which he thought would be occurring often before he was deployed. Instead he and his company spent many days marching and awaiting orders to fight. Henry was distraught and slowly his dreams began to unravel right before…show more content…
He finally begins to let go of his foolish wish when his little sister Pheobe rides the carousel in Central Park. She reaches for the gold ring and instead of being protective and not letting her reach for it, he lets her even at the possibility of her falling. Holden realizes that he cannot save the innocence of children and the best thing to do is to watch over them and give them the chance to fall so that they can grow from the experience. In the act of giving Pheobe a chance to fall, he subsequently gives up on his outlandish dream and shows signs of growth and maturity within
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