“Rip Van Winkle” and the Emergence of an American Mythology. By Danise Bachman Rip van winkle in indeed a classic piece of American mythology. Washington Irving set this story in the past and filled it with exaggerated and sometimes, strange characters. It also features a mysterious and magical occurrence that put the main character to sleep for twenty years!
He goes through famine, having to drop out of school because his family couldn’t afford to send him and having people tell him that his idea was never going to work. These hard times caused him to need to work and study harder. He made sure that he went to the library and he helped his father with the crops so that they could have more food. After he did poorly on his exams he decided that he would work really hard. “I’d study and become the best student at this village school, then take my JCE exam and impress them all.”
This is important to understand because it teaches the reader about what life may have been like for a child living on a farm in the prairie at the time. This is certainly not a normal experience in modern times, even for a child living on a farm today. Many children still do chores for their parents, but not to the point of being physically injured. Tools and machines also exist now to make certain chores easier to complete, revolutionizing the farming
Most literary stories follow a journey pattern either from childhood to adulthood or ignorance to knowledge. Some stories go into depth and demonstrate a lesson within the voyage. A lesson such as not to give to much power to others over yourself; two works that exemplify this type of less are The Great Gatsby and The Wizard of Oz. Both The Great Gatsby and The Wizard of Oz emphasize a character’s journey from ignorance of the meaning of hope to knowledge of the dangers of empowering others over yourself.
Throughout the story, Atticus teaches the children indispensable life lessons. These lessons will eventually help them out later in the story. One outstanding example of an experience that leads to a lesson is when Walter Cunningham comes over for dinner and Scout does not understand why he douses his dinner in molasses. She first asks what he is doing and then Calpurnia pulls her in the kitchen.
Winnie then decides to help Mae escape. A lesson the characters learn is that dying is a part of the natural life cycle and you can’t live without dying. They also learn that living forever is not as good a thing as they were led to beleive. A lesson I will not use is when Jesse tells Winnie when she is seventeen to come back and drink from the spring to be with Jesse forever. Through the events of the story, the characters learn many important lessons.
One prime example of learning of out struggle was when the mother gave Jeannette 200 for one summer. She believes that she can make it work, if she works more. But eventually her father asks her for money and she gives in to the temptation “I pulled my head back. Giving him that money pissed me off. I was mad at myself but even madder at Dad.
Rip Van Winkle pursues a very seldom lifestyle with no pursuit and no ambition. He displays almost no willingness to change from his traditional ways after realizing the American colonies were independent from British Tyranny. He even still accepts the rule of King George III when he enters the town greeting the towns people with saying he is a loyal subject of the king. The reader can see his total disembodiment from the situation when the narrator says “instead of being a subject of his Majesty George the Third, he was now a free citizen of the United States. Rip, in fact, was no politician;
Some of these strategies consisted in making friends with little white boys off the steer, or taking a book on an errand to advance his reading skills. With this new found knowledge his mindset changes, and he starts to see the world differently. Frederick, with his newfound education, now has hope in his life. It took time learn but it won't be a waste in his
In this story, Washington Irving characterizes Rip as a lethargic man, and from my understanding his character is the antithesis of Benjamin Franklin. Rip Van Winkle is a complete contradiction of Benjamin Franklin in almost all aspects of life. Benjamin Franklin was wealthy, ambitious, hardworking, and detailed man who was one of the founding fathers. While Rip lacks motivation, drive for success, and structure in his life.
In novels focusing on parody of European attributes of romanticism Washington Irving created the unexampled masterpieces. “Rip Van Winkle” being one of the unexampled works of Washington Irving combines gentle and perfect humor. This story is Irving’s imaginative reworking of an old German tale in which his valuable parody professionally covered. In the story Washington Irving gave the national shade to the description of events and outlandish beings for America.
Washington Irving’s, The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. is a collection of thirty-four of his essays and short stories. Attributed to the fictional Dutch historian character, Diedrich Knickerbocker, are two of Irving’s most popular stories, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Rip Van Winkle. Rip Van Winkle is the story of a Dutch villager, living at the foot of the Catskill mountains before and after the American Revolutionary War. Van Winkle is genuinely loved by the people of his village, especially by the children whom he tells ghost stories to, plays with, and gives toys. However, this simple, easy-going man has one great error in his character: he is incredibly lazy, despising work in all forms.
1. Introduction This research paper deals with Washington Irving's most famous short story Rip Van Winkle, which tells the story of a man, who falls into a magical sleep during the English colonial time and wakes up twenty years later as a citizen of the United States of America. It will be looked into the characteristics that make Rip Van Winkle a Romantic piece of literature and how Washington Irving's intentions are reflected in his writing. Hereby Washington Irving’s life itself will be taken into consideration together with the Romantic period to demonstrate how these two domains are combined in Rip Van Winkle. 2.
Does Rip Van winkle’s decision to go up the mountian to be free from his wife later affected him in the future? Rip Van Winkle, written by Washington Irving, was published in 1819 and was written around the time of the American Revolution. The american Revolution which took place from 1765 to 1783, was a revolt of thirteen colonies who wanted independence from Great Britain. They gained their independence and defeated England and became the United States. The American Revolution caused many changes in society, the culture, and literature, the people had to try new things like going from having a king to now having a president and living with things they had never experienced in their life before.
