An Episode of War

Throughout “An Episode of War,” Stephen Crane subverts readers’ expectations. Instead of beginning with an exciting battle, as one might expect a war story to do, the story begins with the banality and boredom that the soldiers’ experience in their day-to-day life between battles, in which a “great triumph” is divvying up the coffee into equal measures (paragraph 2, sentence 3). Then, when something “exciting” does occur (the lieutenant getting shot in the arm), it is treated in so subtle a manner that an inattentive reader could easily miss it altogether. It is signaled simply by the lieutenant’s shout, general confusion, and then the others noticing blood on his sleeve. Clearly, Crane is not writing the story in order to glorify the excitement of war or simply entertain through fast-paced action. Instead, Crane focuses on the non-reactions of everyone involved. Not only does the lieutenant not seem to react the way one might expect—after he “crie[s] out” and “wince[s]” and “sway[s] dangerously, he simply “straighten[s]” and looks out across the field to the woods (paragraph 2, sentence 3 and paragraph 3, sentence1)—but the others around him are “statue-like and silent” (paragraph 3, sentence 3).