SAT Reading & Writing Practice Set - The Red Badge of Courage (Adapted)
When Henry Fleming first slipped away from his regiment as it broke under fire, he had not thought of
himself as a deserter; he had thought only of the thunder in his ears and the press of bodies running
toward the rear. Later, with the crash of battle still echoing behind him, he wandered in a forest where a
dead soldier sat against a tree, ants busily climbing over the dull blue of his coat, as if war had already
been forgotten by everything but human memory. The sight made Henry recoil, but it did not send him
back. Instead, when he stumbled upon a column of wounded men dragging themselves from the fight—
arms in slings, heads bandaged, uniforms dark with blood—he felt a sharp envy. Those men bore, on
their bodies, the “red badge” that showed they had faced danger and suffered honestly, while he, whole
and hidden, carried only the secret mark of his flight. The tattered soldier who walked beside him, his
own clothes ripped and stained, kept asking Henry where he was hit, not out of suspicion but out of
rough comradeship; Henry, who had no wound to show, shrank with every question, fearing that the
man’s simple interest might yet strip the disguise from his shame. (Crane, 1895)
Later, in the confusion of another rush of men falling back from the front, Henry was struck on the head
by a rifle swung in irritation by a fellow soldier who thought he was in the way. The blow cut the skin and
sent Henry reeling, half-stunned, with blood running down his face. It was not the kind of wound he had
imagined for himself when he had longed for a “badge of courage,” but it was a wound nonetheless. In
the dark, as stragglers collected and officers tried to sort men back into their places, a friendly soldier
found Henry wandering and led him to his own regiment. The men there received him with the
matter-of-fact kindness they gave any returning comrade; they assumed, without being told, that the
gash on his head had come from a grazing bullet in the line. Henry did not correct them. He let their
praise and concern wash over the story he might have told, pressing his hand to the bandage as if he
could hold their mistaken belief in place and silence the voice inside him that called the wound
something else. (Crane, 1895)
On the day that followed, the regiment was thrown into another engagement, and Henry found himself
at the front of a line of men firing into smoke that thickened and thinned like a living thing. The same
mind that had once measured only how to get away now counted how many volleys the flag needed,
watched how the line held, and felt anger instead of fear when officers spoke of the regiment as “mule
drivers” unlikely to fight. When the color-bearer fell, Henry seized the flag, not in a burst of clear-headed
heroism but in a sudden, fierce determination that the banner at least should not go down. Standing
under it, he felt both exposed and oddly complete, as if the cloth snapping above him might drown the
memory of the field he had once crossed in the opposite direction. After the charge that finally drove
the enemy from a fence line and brought in a captured flag, other soldiers spoke of Henry as if he had
always been the sort of man to lead; they did not know, and he did not tell them, how much of his fury
had been directed at something behind him as well as at the gray forms in front. (Crane, 1895)
When the noise of the last battle receded and the regiment marched away from the smoke, Henry’s
thoughts did not rest only on the day’s praise. The memory of the tattered soldier, stumbling and
pleading to be told where Henry was hurt, returned like a figure in a dream that would not be dismissed.
So did the image of Jim Conklin, his friend from home, dying slowly by the road, and the moment when
Henry had slipped away, unable to bear the sight. These recollections did not crush him as they once
might have done; instead, he turned them over in his mind as elements of a story he now tried to tell
himself more honestly. He knew he had run, and he knew he had later stood. He felt, in the end, neither
like the glorious hero of his first fantasies nor like the cringing coward of his worst fears. Walking under
, a sky that had cleared after rain, he judged his conduct as a mixture of shame and effort, weakness and
growth, and felt a sober kind of peace in admitting both, even as the “red badge” on his head dried into
an ordinary scar that strangers would read more simply than he ever could. (Crane, 1895)
(Adapted from the novel The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane)
QUESTIONS 1–8: MAIN IDEA, BIG PICTURE
1. The passage as a whole primarily emphasizes
A. the detailed movements of armies in a particular Civil War battle.
B. how Henry’s experiences of fear, flight, false wound, and later bravery shape a more
complicated understanding of what courage means.
C. how Henry’s officers punish him for abandoning his regiment.
D. the way the tattered soldier becomes the regiment’s official flag-bearer.
2. Across the four paragraphs, Henry is presented chiefly as a character who
A. never doubts his courage and behaves consistently heroically.
B. moves from romantic fantasies of heroism, through self-deception and shame, toward a
more realistic and mixed view of himself.
C. cares only about earning medals from his officers.
D. remains convinced that physical wounds are the only sign of bravery.
3. The first paragraph’s description of Henry’s envy of the wounded men mainly serves to show
that he
A. values any kind of suffering more than safety.
B. understands from the start that running away was the wiser choice.
C. is torn between his fear of battle and his desire for visible proof that he belongs among those
who have faced it.
D. wishes to become a surgeon.
4. Taken together, the second and third paragraphs primarily highlight
A. the way a purely accidental injury becomes, in other men’s eyes, evidence of bravery that
Henry later tries to justify through his actions.
B. that Henry is more concerned with bandages than with battle.
C. how officers always misinterpret their soldiers’ motives.
D. that Henry deliberately injures himself in order to impress his regiment.
5. Which statement best expresses a central theme developed in the passage?
A. Once a soldier runs from battle, he can never act bravely again.
B. True self-knowledge often emerges only after a person has confronted both cowardice and
courage in himself.
C. Physical scars always reveal the full moral meaning of past actions.
D. War reliably turns boys into flawless heroes.
When Henry Fleming first slipped away from his regiment as it broke under fire, he had not thought of
himself as a deserter; he had thought only of the thunder in his ears and the press of bodies running
toward the rear. Later, with the crash of battle still echoing behind him, he wandered in a forest where a
dead soldier sat against a tree, ants busily climbing over the dull blue of his coat, as if war had already
been forgotten by everything but human memory. The sight made Henry recoil, but it did not send him
back. Instead, when he stumbled upon a column of wounded men dragging themselves from the fight—
arms in slings, heads bandaged, uniforms dark with blood—he felt a sharp envy. Those men bore, on
their bodies, the “red badge” that showed they had faced danger and suffered honestly, while he, whole
and hidden, carried only the secret mark of his flight. The tattered soldier who walked beside him, his
own clothes ripped and stained, kept asking Henry where he was hit, not out of suspicion but out of
rough comradeship; Henry, who had no wound to show, shrank with every question, fearing that the
man’s simple interest might yet strip the disguise from his shame. (Crane, 1895)
Later, in the confusion of another rush of men falling back from the front, Henry was struck on the head
by a rifle swung in irritation by a fellow soldier who thought he was in the way. The blow cut the skin and
sent Henry reeling, half-stunned, with blood running down his face. It was not the kind of wound he had
imagined for himself when he had longed for a “badge of courage,” but it was a wound nonetheless. In
the dark, as stragglers collected and officers tried to sort men back into their places, a friendly soldier
found Henry wandering and led him to his own regiment. The men there received him with the
matter-of-fact kindness they gave any returning comrade; they assumed, without being told, that the
gash on his head had come from a grazing bullet in the line. Henry did not correct them. He let their
praise and concern wash over the story he might have told, pressing his hand to the bandage as if he
could hold their mistaken belief in place and silence the voice inside him that called the wound
something else. (Crane, 1895)
On the day that followed, the regiment was thrown into another engagement, and Henry found himself
at the front of a line of men firing into smoke that thickened and thinned like a living thing. The same
mind that had once measured only how to get away now counted how many volleys the flag needed,
watched how the line held, and felt anger instead of fear when officers spoke of the regiment as “mule
drivers” unlikely to fight. When the color-bearer fell, Henry seized the flag, not in a burst of clear-headed
heroism but in a sudden, fierce determination that the banner at least should not go down. Standing
under it, he felt both exposed and oddly complete, as if the cloth snapping above him might drown the
memory of the field he had once crossed in the opposite direction. After the charge that finally drove
the enemy from a fence line and brought in a captured flag, other soldiers spoke of Henry as if he had
always been the sort of man to lead; they did not know, and he did not tell them, how much of his fury
had been directed at something behind him as well as at the gray forms in front. (Crane, 1895)
When the noise of the last battle receded and the regiment marched away from the smoke, Henry’s
thoughts did not rest only on the day’s praise. The memory of the tattered soldier, stumbling and
pleading to be told where Henry was hurt, returned like a figure in a dream that would not be dismissed.
So did the image of Jim Conklin, his friend from home, dying slowly by the road, and the moment when
Henry had slipped away, unable to bear the sight. These recollections did not crush him as they once
might have done; instead, he turned them over in his mind as elements of a story he now tried to tell
himself more honestly. He knew he had run, and he knew he had later stood. He felt, in the end, neither
like the glorious hero of his first fantasies nor like the cringing coward of his worst fears. Walking under
, a sky that had cleared after rain, he judged his conduct as a mixture of shame and effort, weakness and
growth, and felt a sober kind of peace in admitting both, even as the “red badge” on his head dried into
an ordinary scar that strangers would read more simply than he ever could. (Crane, 1895)
(Adapted from the novel The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane)
QUESTIONS 1–8: MAIN IDEA, BIG PICTURE
1. The passage as a whole primarily emphasizes
A. the detailed movements of armies in a particular Civil War battle.
B. how Henry’s experiences of fear, flight, false wound, and later bravery shape a more
complicated understanding of what courage means.
C. how Henry’s officers punish him for abandoning his regiment.
D. the way the tattered soldier becomes the regiment’s official flag-bearer.
2. Across the four paragraphs, Henry is presented chiefly as a character who
A. never doubts his courage and behaves consistently heroically.
B. moves from romantic fantasies of heroism, through self-deception and shame, toward a
more realistic and mixed view of himself.
C. cares only about earning medals from his officers.
D. remains convinced that physical wounds are the only sign of bravery.
3. The first paragraph’s description of Henry’s envy of the wounded men mainly serves to show
that he
A. values any kind of suffering more than safety.
B. understands from the start that running away was the wiser choice.
C. is torn between his fear of battle and his desire for visible proof that he belongs among those
who have faced it.
D. wishes to become a surgeon.
4. Taken together, the second and third paragraphs primarily highlight
A. the way a purely accidental injury becomes, in other men’s eyes, evidence of bravery that
Henry later tries to justify through his actions.
B. that Henry is more concerned with bandages than with battle.
C. how officers always misinterpret their soldiers’ motives.
D. that Henry deliberately injures himself in order to impress his regiment.
5. Which statement best expresses a central theme developed in the passage?
A. Once a soldier runs from battle, he can never act bravely again.
B. True self-knowledge often emerges only after a person has confronted both cowardice and
courage in himself.
C. Physical scars always reveal the full moral meaning of past actions.
D. War reliably turns boys into flawless heroes.
