An Episode of War

“He was on the verge of a great triumph in mathematics, […] when suddenly the lieutenant cried out and looked quickly at a man near him as if he suspected it was a case of personal assault.”

This is the moment in which the lieutenant is wounded. Here, we can see the subtlety of Crane’s writing style and the way he plays with anticlimax and situational irony: the lieutenant’s downfall happens right at the cusp of triumph, albeit a minor one. Not only that, this moment contrasts the banality established in the first paragraph and first half of the second paragraph with the changed status of the lieutenant as a wounded man in the rest of the story. 

“During this moment the men about him gazed statue-like and silent, astonished and awed by this catastrophe which happened when catastrophes were not expected—when they had leisure to observe it.” 

Here we see the narration shift into a more didactic mode, providing almost a moral of the story: that bad things often happen when one least expects them. The “leisure” of the opening scene has been disrupted by “catastrophe.” It also contrasts catastrophes in the pitched heat of battle to this one, taking place as it does during a relative lull in the action, which allows it to be more visible, since the other soldiers have the luxury of observing beyond the life-and-death import of what is directly in front of them.

“As the lieutenant stared at the wood, they too swung their heads, so that for another instant all hands, still silent, contemplated the distant forest as if their minds were fixed upon the mystery of a bullet’s journey.” 

Here the narrator becomes almost a collective consciousness, encompassing all the men present in the scene and speaking for their mental state, albeit hypothetically. We also see one of the many similar uses of the phrase “as if” that Crane produces throughout the story as a signifier for figurative language to follow—in this case the contemplation of the bullet and its implied portentousness. 

“In short, this weapon had of a sudden become a strange thing to him.” 

A clear moment of defamiliarization, this line helps establish the lieutenant’s state of mind directly following being shot. Nothing is the same, as the end of the story makes clear, when the reader learns that the lieutenant’s arm has been amputated. This sense of defamiliarization effectively communicates the detached feeling of shock the lieutenant is experiencing.

“A wound gives strange dignity to him who bears it. Well men shy from his new and terrible majesty. It is as if the wounded man’s hand is upon the curtain which hangs before the revelations of all existence […] and the power of it sheds radiance upon a bloody form, and makes the other men understand sometimes that they are little.” 

This passage marks one of the stages of perception regarding the lieutenant’s wound. This first stage has the uninjured fellow soldiers viewing the injury with awe and fear, endowing it with power to gain knowledge they cannot have without themselves being injured as well. Crane uses the metaphor of the curtain in order to comment on the hidden nature of this knowledge, but also the ease with which it can be revealed, given the right circumstances. 

“He wore the look of one who knows he is the victim of a terrible disease and understands his helplessness.” 

This line presents the lieutenant as a stoic, long-suffering bearer of a respectable malady. It also returns the reader to the theme of knowledge. Here, it is as if the lieutenant has accepted the orderly sergeant’s assessment that his wound has granted him some kind of power. At the same time, Crane evokes helplessness, alluding to the idea that fate cannot be reversed, and instead the best one can do is bear it with dignity.

“And the men in silence stared at the wood, then at the departing lieutenant; then at the wood, then at the lieutenant.” 

This line marks a turning point in the story. While at first the story focused on the lieutenant in the context of the front line and as a member of the community of soldiers surrounding him, from this point forward, he parts ways with both the setting and the characters.

“As the wounded officer passed from the line of battle, he was enabled to see many things which as a participant in the fight were unknown to him.” 

This quotation begins to develop the themes of perception and knowledge. By gaining distance from the battlefield, the lieutenant has gotten a broader view of the battle and a more objective view than the subjective vision of a participant. It is this broader perception that allows the lieutenant to see the absurdity of the battlefront before him that previously had remained hidden. This also serves to set up the contrast between the soldiers who are on the front lines and those at the rear.

“It was, for a wonder, precisely like a historical painting.”

The comparison in this line of the battlefield to a painting is an example of the way Crane uses simile to create an effect. Because of the lieutenant’s new perspective at this point, removed from the front to gain a broader, more complete picture, he is able to find the distance and objectivity a painter needs to create a work of art. No one can paint while in the heat of battle.

“[The battery] made halts as dramatic as the crash of a wave on the rocks, and when it fled outward this aggregation of wheels, levers, motors had a beautiful unity, as if it were a missile.” 

Here we see an example of Crane’s use of synecdoche, as well simile. The comparison to a wave crashing on the shore effectively transmits the idea of the chaotic movement of the battalion seen from the lieutenant’s vantage point. The “aggregation” of parts also creates a sense of confusion and fracture that gives the reader a sense of what the battlefield wound feels like to an injured soldier at a remove.

“His tone allowed one to think that he was in the habit of being wounded every day. The lieutenant hung his head, feeling, in this presence, that he did not know how to be correctly wounded.” 

The uncertainty and shame that the lieutenant feels in this line, as if he "[does] not know how to be correctly wounded," ties directly into the themes of both knowledge and perception. Earlier in the story, the other soldiers seemed to think him full of a powerful and mysterious knowledge withheld from them since he was wounded, something they were not. There also seemed to be a certain amount of respect and fear. Here, however, the role is reversed slightly. This healthy soldier (who perhaps has been wounded before, though that is not stated in the story) now seems to have the knowledge the lieutenant lacks. This, in turn, ties into the theme of perception in that both the wounded soldier and well soldier can easily think the other has more knowledge, implying that a sense of inferiority can be universal, no matter one's circumstances.

"The lieutenant wished to rush forward and inform him that he was dying." 

Taking place in the chaotic scene when the lieutenant arrives at the hospital, the "him" being referred to here is the soldier sitting against a tree, smoking a pipe. This particular line is interesting because it could be read in at least two ways, due to the vague pronoun usage. While it is pretty clear that the "him" is referring to the seated soldier, the "he" that follows it remains ambiguous. It could refer again to the seated man, which seems like the more logical choice given his face is "as gray as a new army blanket" (paragraph 17, sentence 8). However, it could also refer to the lieutenant himself, having a premonition that his injury is actually worse than the story makes it appear. 

"[...] his glance fixed upon the door of the old school house, as sinister to him as the portals of death. And this is the story of how the lieutenant lost his arm."

This transition between the penultimate paragraph and the final paragraph presents a quick moment of foreshadowing followed by immediate payoff. The lieutenant's premonition of death in the schoolhouse door, though not completely accurate, did come true in the sense that his life has been irreconcilably altered. There is also a noticeable shift in tone between the two paragraphs. Paragraph 23 ends with a lyrical piece of imagery, but paragraph 24 begins with a narratorial voice similar to that of one of Aesop's Fables.This tonal shift helps orient the reader to the jump in time that occurs simultaneously, as well.