War reports--both fact and fiction--have fascinated people since the first warriors and bards that sat around campfires. Not all war literature is based on firsthand experiences, so some comes out of peoples? imaginations. One of America?s most prominent war novelists, Stephen Crane, wrote about war before he ever saw battle. Crane?s short novel The Red Badge of Courage, about a young soldier?s reactions to fear during a major Civil War battle, was written almost thirty years after the battle took place.
Many of Ernest Hemingway?s novels and stories were based on his own experiences durin…