Rip Van Winkle Analysis Washington Irving is very creative in the way he expresses and crafts the themes in his stories. Taking a common subject, he adds mystery and a moral lesson to make it interesting to the reader. The advancement of time and its connection to change are depicted in Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle through the main character’s transition to future years, the preserved mysterious forest, and the development of the township from past to present.
Rip Van Winkle starts out a lazy, good-natured man with no personal motivation in life, but his experiences change him into a man with a new found freedom and happiness. Because of his nagging wife, and large family to support, Rip was unable to carelessly do the things he enjoys. “If left to himself, he would whistled life away in perfect contentment; but his wife kept continuously dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness, and the ruin he was bringing on his family” (Irving 671). After venturing into the mysterious forest, and having unusual experiences, Rip found himself twenty years in
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Upon his arrival in the wooded mountains, Rip sensed that something wasn’t right. He met some mysterious creatures, drank nm unknown beverage, and joined in a big feast. “He even ventured when no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had much of the flavor of excellent Hollands”(675). After a long night, he fell into a dazzy sleep, not knowing what was in store for him. As he woke up, he sensed a difference. Although overtime the forest hadn’t changed, he sees that he has. He was perplexed with how he had changed, and confused with why the forest hadn’t. Irving gaves the forest a sort of eerie mood. There is a clear contrast in the change of Rip, and the stagnation of the woods. The magic of the woodland mountaintop kept it preserved, while at the same time it allowed Rip to
Rip is viewed in the town as a person who helped everyone with anything, except his own family- “…he was a simple ...
In “Rip Van Winkle” by Washington Irving he writes about a simple man, Rip Van Winkle, who does just enough to get by in life. He lives in a village by the catskill mountains, and is loved by everyone in the village. He is an easy going man, who spends most of his days at the village inn talking with his neighbors, fishing all day, and wandering the mountains with his dog to refuge from his wife the thorn on his side. On one of his trips to the mountains Rip Van Winkle stumbles upon a group of men who offer him a drink, and that drink changes everything for Van Winkle. He later wakes up, twenty years later, and returns to his village were he notices nothing is the same from when he left. He learns that King George III is no longer in charge,
Rip Van Winkle had grabbed his gun and his dog, Wolf, and headed out to the woods. He rested under a tree where evening came on quickly. As Rip was getting ready to journey back home, he heard a voice calling his name. He went to see who was calling his name. He discovered an old man carrying a keg on his back. Rip and the old man walked to a ravine in the mountain. There they found a band of odd-looking people. Rip and the old man drank from the keg the man was carrying on his back. Rip feel into a deep sleep, which bring us up to his awaking.
Irving use of irony is evident throughout the story. “I have observed that he was a simple good-natured man; he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient hen-pecked husband (Rip Van Winkle.” “Irving uses their relationship to satirize loveless marriages. Rips wife hates his laziness, and he hates her nagging
Throughout the story of "Rip Van Winkle", there are many peculiar events that occur; specifically the time during which Rip is in the Catskill mountains. It seems very odd that a man would wander into mountains only to fall asleep for twenty consecutive years without ever waking. One would think this nearly impossible without the assistance of certain modern medicine. The group of men that Rip encountered in the Catskills were rather outlandish, as was the drink which they offered to Van Winkle. “ He assured the company that it was a fact, handed down from his ancestor the historian, that the Kaatskill mountains had always been haunted by strange beings”
In RIP Van Winkle, Dam Van Winkle is abusive, nagging, and sarcastic. In Rip Van Winkle, Washington Irving states that “but what courage can with stand the ever-during and all besetting terrors of a woman’s tongue.” He seems to imply that he did not like women who gave their opinions and spoke their mind. It seems that Rip is going into the woods to escape his wife.
In Rip Van Winkle, Irving shows his doubts in the American Identity and the American dream. After the Revolutionary war, America was trying to develop its own course. They were free to govern their own course of development; however, some of them had an air of uncertainties on their own identity in this new country. Irving was born among this generation in the newly created United States of America, and also felt uncertainty about the American identity. Irving might be the writer that is the least positive about being an American. The main reason for this uncertainty is the new born American has no history and tradition while the Europe has a great one accumulated for thousands of years. Therefore, in order to solve this problem, Irving borrows an old European tale to make it take place in America. This tale related to the Dutch colonists haunts the kaatskill mountains. In order to highlight the American identity, Irving praises the “majestic” mountains which Europe lacks. He describes the mountains that “their summits…will glow and light up like a crown of glory” Nevertheless, the use of these ancient explorers into Rip Van Winkle only to show that although American has formed its own identity, no one can cut its connection with Europe. No wonder when America was still under tyranny of the British rule, some people still cannot cut the blood relationship with Europe. Therefore, the American identity is blurred by their relationship with Europe since then.
The story becomes more interesting as from his awakening after a mythically long sleep. Everything in his village has been changed as he comes back. He does not recognize anything as well as no one recognizes him. So, what has happened to him and his village? And do you think that Rip really spends such a long sleep? Actually, through the character of Rip Van Winkle, the author likes to convey to the readers what has been changed after the American getting independent. We can feel that changing is a natural phenomenon "change of season, change of weather, every hour of a day have something changing." The author uses the image of village here as a representative for people living in the society and Rip is for some people who do not change accordingly or who do not recognize and catch up the changing of a new life. With some people, who lived before the revolution, are complacent ones. They very often sit together talking about nothing, about what happened in several months ago but they become the eager people who are with full energy in take part in the society business. People are on changing for getting a new life, a new culture.
Rip Van Winkle and Young Goodman Brown both take place in small, early American villages. Rip Van Winkle is a resident of Catskill, New York, just next to the Hudson River. He was a kind-hearted, willing to please, neighborly man who was greatly admired by the women, children, and dogs of the town. Rip Van Winkle was always willing do favors and help neighbors out whenever they asked, but never wanted to do any work on his own farm. Rip Van Winkle was married to Dame Van Winkle. Dame was a short tempered woman who spends all of her time criticizing and nagged Rip about his responsibilities to the family and farm. Rip and Dane did not get along and the relationship continued to get worse. He would often leave the house to go to the bar or hunting in the woods to get away from his nagging wife. Goodman Brown is a resident of Salem, Massachusetts. He came from a Christian family that is known in the community as being godly men. He newly married to his wife, Faith. Faith wears pink ribbons in her hair, representing innocence. Like Goodman Brown, Faith is pure-hearted and religious. He viewed her as beautiful, trusting, and representation of purity and high moral standards.
“Rip Van Winkle”, a short story written by Washington Irving, is known for being a tale that illustrates multiple aspects of life before and after the American Revolution. After spending twenty years in the forest asleep, Rip Van Wrinkle returns to his quaint village to find his home transformed into a bustling town. By the end of the story, he has become a local historian; telling the townspeople what the village was like in days before the revolution. The events of “Rip Van Winkle” occurred due to the actions of Rip Van Winkle’s wife: Dame Van Winkle. Dame Van Winkle can be viewed as the main antagonist in “Rip Van Winkle”, as well as a symbol of Great Britain before and after the American Revolution.
Some aspects of Rip’s character act as a symbol for America’s journey to independence. Rip values his freedom but does not actively rebel against his wife’s control. In this case, Rip’s freedom represents the colonies freedom caused by their distance from Britain, and Rip’s wife represents Britain. Rip’s disorientation
In the text Irving says,” He would never refuse to assist a neighbor even the roughest toil, and was a foremost man at all country frolics for husking Indian corn or building stone-fences; the women of the village, too, used to employ him to run their errands, and to do such little old jobs as their less obliging husbands would not do for them” (311). Instead of asking for a job at the inn, he would just sit up there listening to the most prestigious men in their community talk about nothing. It was times his wife had to come get him and she would fuss and nag all the way home. Everyone in town loved Rip, but they also knew he was not very ambitious. When he got tired of hearing his wife’s mouth he would play different games, but hunting squirrels was his favorite. For example in the text Irving wrote,” In a long ramble of the kind on a fine autumnal day, Rip had unconsciously scrambled to one of the highest parts of the Kaatskill mountains. He was after his favorite sport of shooting squirrels, and the still solitudes had echoed and re-echoed with reports of his gun” (313). Sometimes if he got too tired from his activity, he would fall asleep in
“Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair; and his only alternative to escape from the labour of the farm and the clamour of his wife, was to take gun in hand, and stroll away…” (Irving 474). Rip admires his surroundings observing the beauty of the Hudson River Valley and is dreading the thoughts of having to go back home as nightfall approaches, until he hears his name being called. Immediately the reader sees the change in setting. “Rip now felt a vague apprehension stealing over him; he looked anxiously in the same direction, and perceived a strange figure slowly toiling up the rocks, and bending under the weight of something he carried on his back” (Irving 475). Rip proceeds to help the stranger up the mountain with a keg, taking note of distant thunder every now and then; this setting infers to trouble ahead. When Irving describes the entrance into the amphitheater we are given a somewhat detailed description of the men that were playing nine-pins. “The whole group reminded Rip of the figures in an old Flemish painting, in the parlour of Dominie Van Schaick, the village parson, and which had been brought over from Holland at the time of the settlement” (Irving
When Rip awakens after a two decade slumber he is unaware of how much the world around him has changed. When Rip arrives to the town his only the only thing he is worrying about is the lecture he will be receiving from Dame “he dreaded to meet his wife” (Irving 86). Rip arrives in the town shocked when he finds the image of King George III replaced by George Washington. As Rip proceeds through the neighborhood that he once knew, he becomes confused and unable to comprehend the current government which he is now living under, so much that he is baffled when he is questioned by towns’ people as to “which side he voted?” (Irving 89). Although there were still plenty of loyalist around at the time of Rips awakening “The revolution awoke the fire within the American Spirit and the townspeople became alive with anticipation of their new government” (Freeman). Rip is now having to adapt to these patriotic
After many of them stroke their chins upon looking at him, Rip unconsciously strokes his own and finds that his beard has grown a foot long. The town itself looks different. At first, Rip thinks that the liquor from the keg has addled his head, for he has a hard time finding his own house. When he does locate it at last, he finds it in a state of decay. Even the sign over the inn has been changed to one carrying the name of General Washington. The men who are gathered under the sign talk gibberish to him, and they accuse him of trying to stir up trouble by coming armed to an election. When he is finally able to inquire into the whereabouts of his old friends, he is told that men by those names have moved away or have been dead for twenty