Rip Van Winkle Analysis

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The Journey Beyond
The characters in Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving and Young Goodman Brown by Nathaniel Hawthorn both leave their wives to embark on a journey for different reasons, experiencing different conflicts, and return home with a different attitude about their life. On their journey, both characters encounter bizarre, unnatural events. Throughout both stories, the authors construct a clear picture of how society was, the role of gender, and religion.
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.
Both Rip Van Winkle and Goodman Brown have different motives as to why they are departing from t...

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... world. He cannot believe the words of the minister and does not fully love his wife which lead him to live his life in sadness and dismay.
The characters in Rip Van Winkle by Washington Irving and Young Goodman Brown by Nathaniel Hawthorn both leave their wives to embark on a journey for different reasons, experiencing different conflicts, and return home with a different attitude about their life. Rip Van Winkle left his wife on a journey to get away from her, facing many obstacles like the old man with the keg, and returned home happy with his life away from work, King George, and his wife. Goodman Brown sets out on a journey away from his wife because he promised to meet someone, he too facing many obstacles such as the old man with the staff who turns out to be the devil. He then returns home believing that everyone is bad and there is no good in the world.

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