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The portrayal of women in literature
Female stereotypes in media
The portrayal of women in literature
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In his stories the women were not portrayed as nice. Women were usually nagging and would fight with their husbands. Some critics felt that Irving took an anti-feminism approach to his writing. However some critic feel that The Legend of Sleepy Hollow shows importance of marriage. Some critics also argue the quality of his work. Some pieces of his work are considered remarkable. While other pieces of his work are considered not to be that good.
Irving’s health was also not very good and he had tuberculosis. So his brothers decided to send him overseas to Rome to recover. Irving was engaged to Matilda Hoffman. Matilda Hoffman passed away suddenly and Irving took her death pretty hard. Irving did go out with two women over two years but remained a bachelor his entire life.
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 the Devil and Tom Walker Tom’s wife has a temper, loud mouth and she was strong . His face sometimes showed signs that their fighting may have been more than words. She would hide things from Tom. They did not have a very good marriage. Again Irving portrayed the wife as loud and nagging.
In The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Irving portrayed women differently. Katrina Van Tassel is very beautiful, sexy and a flirt. Katrina knew what the power of her beauty could do. Although Katrina isn’t a nag like Dam Van Winkle, she was bad in a different way. Katrina seemed to know what and who she wanted and was willing to use her beauty and sexuality to get what she wants.
In my opinion, Irving did not like women very much. He seemed to think that most women were nagging and abusive or they would use their beauty to get what they want. He seemed to think that most men wanted to get back or get even with women. I don’t think that his portrayal of Dame Van Winkle was fair. He portrayed her as being mean and unfair to Rip.
In the story, Irving used characterization to create the backstory, characters, and character’s personalities. Irving used direct characterization, so he could describe each character in the beginning of the story. The main character is Ichabod Crane was pictured as a school teacher, love interest of Katherina Van Tassel, and newcomer of Sleepy Hollow. Few people did not like the fact Crane wanted Van Tassel’s hand in marriage because of his position in society. In the story, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Crane was described as a simple person with no beautiful features and not the type of man that a woman like Katherina
In Washington Irving’s “Rip Van Winkle,” an allegorical reading can be seen. The genius of Irving shines through, in not only his representation in the story, but also in his ability to represent both sides of the hot political issues of the day. Because it was written during the revolutionary times, Irving had to cater to a mixed audience of Colonists and Tories. The reader’s political interest, whether British or Colonial, is mutually represented allegorically in “Rip Van Winkle,” depending on who is reading it. Irving uses Rip, Dame, and his setting to relate these allegorical images on both sides. Irving would achieve success in both England and America, in large part because his political satires had individual allegorical meanings.
Within this story, the man fell in love with a woman who unfortunately did not obtain the same feelings for him. This shows a bad side of women by basically stating that they will ruin a man’s life without feeling bad for him nor having sympathy for hurting him. Consistently, in his stories he shows that women are a burden in the men’s lives. On the other hand, all women do not act in such a manner. Without a doubt, these women in the story are the one percent. Irving strong passion of hate toward women is a reason unknown. Irving lose his wife at a young age, his wife died at the young age of seventeen. They were soon to be married and Irving loved her dearly, but after she died, he never engaged, married, or dated a woman. It is a possibility that he resented his wife for dying. That he took all the bad actions she did and buried them inside, hating women for life. I each of his stories he has the woman doing something the husband to not like. So, maybe each thing the women did in the stories was from what his wife use to do. If he would have took all the good she did out of their relationship when his soon to be wife died, Irving would be a whole different person. It is strange how people interpret certain thing can change the perspective of how they see things for the rest of their
“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” represents Irving’s second comic masterpiece, a ghostly tale about things that go bump in the night. The tale opens with a description of the Hudson Valley region of Sleepy Hollow.The main character Ichabod crane is a narcissist because all he cares about is himself and getting rich. His character reminds the reader of someone who manipulates people and tries to make the pity them for money and stuff that he wants. He adds that type of snarky kind of
Irving's main character, Icabod Crane, causes a stir and disrupts the female order in the Hollow when he arrives from Connecticut. Crane is not only a representative of bustling, practical New England who threatens rural America with his many talents and fortune of knowledge; he is also an intrusive male who threatens the stability of a decidedly female place. By taking a closer look at the stories that circulate though Sleepy Hollow, one can see that Crane's expulsion follows directly from women's cultivation of local folklore. Female-centered Sleepy Hollow, by means of tales revolving around the emasculated, headless "dominant spirit" of region, figuratively neuters threatening masculine invaders like Crane to restore order and ensure the continuance of the old Dutch domesticity and their old wives' tales.
During the founding of the nation, women were often viewed as subordinate to men. This social prejudice was a major characteristic of the nation’s founding. This characteristic of the early United States is present in both “The Legend of Sleepy Hallow” and “Rip Van Winkle”. In “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” Washington Irving creates the character Katrina Van Tassel. She is used to demonstrate the stereotypes of women at the time. In “Rip Van Winkle” Irving uses, Dame Van Winkle to similarly display negative stereotypes of women. These prejudices against women were not only seen in the founding years of this nation, but for many years to follow.
Washington Irving’s short story, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” was adapted into a movie titled “Sleepy Hollow” directed by Tim Burton nearly two centuries after the original publication. When the story was adapted as a film, several extensive changes were made. A short story easily read in one sitting was turned into a nearly two-hour thriller, mystery, and horror movie by incorporating new details and modifying the original version of the story. The short story relates the failed courtship of Katrina Van Tassel by Ichabod Crane. His courtship is cut short by the classic romance antagonist-the bigger, stronger, and better looking Broom Bones. Ichabod wishes to marry Katrina because of her beauty but also because of the wealthy inheritance she will receive when her father, Baltus Van Tassel and stepmother, Lady Van Tassel die. However, the film tells the story of Ichabod Crane as an investigator who is sent to Sleepy Hollow to investigate the recent decapitations that are occurring. These modifications alter the original story entirely, thus failing to capture the Irving’s true interpretation of “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” The film and the original story have similarities and differences in the plot, characters, and setting.
In the short story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” by Washington Irving, the word went around stating that Katrina Van Tassel is in search a of a husband. I Ichabod Crane do believe that I would make a superb husband for Katrina! Katrina Van Tassel deserves to be treated like royalty, and I believe that as her husband, I would be able to follow through with that requirement. I think that I would make the perfect husband for Katrina, because I am a disciplined and a conscientious man. For example, “[I] was a conscientious man. [I] always kept in mind the golden rule, spare the rod and spoil the child.” As a school master it is important to follow through with your obligations, and following through with orders is key to having a good and healthy
In the story “The Devil and Tom Walker”, the author displays greed by explaining the relationship between Tom Walker and his wife. This passage says “whatever the woman could lay hands on, she hid away.” They both were very parsimonious and did not like to share their values with one another, nor did they keep it near the other. Tom Walker "was not a man to stick at trifles when money was in view." As the story continues, Tom Walker was given the chance to make a deal with the devil, but he turned it down because he’s acquisitive that he does not want to share the wealth with his own wife. As someone who likes to loan money, he claims that he likes to help the people whom he is close to in need, but the truth is that "In proportion to the distress
Washington Irving’s written work, The legend of Sleepy Hollow is amazing and I recommend to anyone and everyone. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow contains an eerie tale of a headless horseman, a piece of romance who had two men by the names of Ichabod Crane and Brom Van Brunt going head to head with one another for a woman’s love, and a piece of history is also incorporated because it is somewhat related to what Washington Irving went through as a child being brought up through the times of the American Revolution (Rust
However, leeway should be given to him, because in Sleepy Hollow Irving doesn't show any major signs of using misogyny. In this story, he did not portray women to be cruel or hateful to the main male characters, unlike The Devil and Tom Walker, Rip Van Winkle. “Katrina Van Tassel in Sleepy Hollow was not mean or cruel she was universally famed for being pretty.” (paragraph 21) “In addition to this, Rip Van Winkle’s daughter was not mean to her husband like her mother.” (Paragraph 57) Also in that story “ the neighbor's wives took Rip Van Winkle’s side in domestic squabbles with his wife.”(Paragraph 5)
For a large part of his life, Stoker knew the world famous actor Henry Irving. Irving is said to have even inspired the Dracula character. Brigitte Boudreau states that “Many have described the friendship as one where Irving – like the notorious Count-depleted Stoker both physically and emotionally, from the moment they met until Irving’s last breath.” (Boudreau, 44).This is interesting for Stoker may have even been a closeted homosexual who was in love with Irving even though he had a wife named Florence Stoker at the time. In fact he was so devoted to him that he wrote an entire “idolatrous biography” about Irving. However, he was more likely to have been a “homosocial” man which means that he mostly associated himself with other men instead
Irving satirizes many key elements in the story. The most prominent of these are the characters and setting.
Throughout American Literature, women have been depicted in many different ways. The portrayal of women in American Literature is often influenced by an author's personal experience or a frequent societal stereotype of women and their position. Often times, male authors interpret society’s views of women in a completely different nature than a female author would. While F. Scott Fitzgerald may represent his main female character as a victim in the 1920’s, Zora Neale Hurston portrays hers as a strong, free-spirited, and independent woman only a decade later in the 1930’s.
In conclusion, while Rip Van Winkle is just a character in a short story, he is also a representative for the American colonies in both pre- and post-Revolutionary War times; whereas his spouse, Dame Van Winkle is not just a mean old wife, but also a representative of Great Britain in both pre- and post-war times. Through their relationship, Washington Irving paints a symbolic picture of the transition from dependent colonies into an independent nation for America, and the downfall of British rule on North American ground.