Rip Van Winkle: A Portrait of the American People Before and After the Revolution

1301 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Short summary of rip van winkle

After the American Revolution there were many of the American people who were lost as to whom they were now. There were two definite groups that had been created, those that were for the revolution and those that were against. At the same time, there were some that had just ridden along for the ride. When the revolution came to an end, there were people who were stuck in the middle confused as to who they were and what being an American specifically meant. Washington Irving shows this fear in his short story called “Rip Van Winkle”. In this short story, he brings to life the common fear and confusion that was among the people. Few were sure of who they were and who was considered their friends or their enemies. I want to show how George Irving used the fictitious character of Rip Van Winkle to show the different characteristics of the American people before and after the American Revolution.

Washington Irving first places Rip Van Winkle into a similar situation that American’s had just been facing. American’s were suffering brutal and terrible control from the United Kingdom. They wanted to escape the control and thus they broke away. Like the American’s, Rip Van Winkle was under suppressive control by Dame Van Winkle. Irving describes her by saying, “A termagant wife may, therefore, in some respects, be considered a tolerable blessing; and if so, Rip Van Winkle was thrice blessed” (Baym 955). All he sought to do was break away from her. This is when he decided to leave his town to go hunting so he could get a break from the retched women. Rip shows the commonalities in both parties departing away from something that was so familiar and comfortable to them. In Sarah Wyman’s article she discuss this event that Rip goes through...

... middle of paper ...

...lear precise view of how we began as a people and what we turned into. We are able to look more at the American people through the Rip Van Winkle character and understand more completely what the people of that time were going through.

Works Cited

1. Allen, Thomas B. “One Revolution Two Wars.” Military History. 27.5 (2011): 58-63. Academic Search Premier. EBSCO. Web. 26. Oct. 2011.

2. Baym, Nina. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. B. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2007. 954-965. Print.

3. Beidler, Philip. “America’s Fairy Tale.” Fairy Tale Review. (2008): 19-30. Print.

4. Ferguson, Robert, A. “Rip Van Winkle and the Generational Divide in the American Culture.” Early American Literature. 40.3. (2005): 529-544. Print.

5. Wyman, Sarah. “Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle: A Dangerous Critique of a New Nation.” ANQ. 23.4 (2010): 216-222. Print.

Show More
Related

  • Comparison of Daisy Miller and The Yellow Wallpaper

    1214 Words  | 3 Pages

    Perkins, Geroge, and Barbara Perkins. The American Tradition in Literature. 12th ed. Vol. 2. New York: McGraw Hill, 2009. Print

    Read More

  • Irving's Portrayal of Women in His Novels

    649 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Jacobs & Douglass: An Insight Into The Experience of The American Slave

    1006 Words  | 3 Pages

    ...n American Literature. By Henry Louis. Gates and Nellie Y. McKay. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2004. 387-452. Print.

    Read More

  • Writers During The Age of Discovery and The Romantic Period

    1169 Words  | 3 Pages

    Perkins George, Barbara. The American Tradition in Literature, 12th ed. New York: McGraw Hill, 2009. Print

    Read More

  • Myth Of The Millennial Nation

    1140 Words  | 3 Pages

    Hughes initially dissects the myth into its national cause and effect, both good and bad. His emphasis on the crude and regrettable parts of our nation's history may lead readers to assume his discontent with our nation's history; though eventually his revealed views are more salutary and beneficial. I find Hughes' apparent apathy and objectivity on this subject to be most disturbing and even perplexing.

    Read More

  • America and the Decay of Morality: The Great Gatsby and The Sun Also Rises Introduction

    2099 Words  | 5 Pages

    The purpose of this essay is to examine how the two modernist writers depict America in the 1920’s in a state of moral decay and the pursuit for material wealth gradually replaces the purity of conventional moral ideals and beliefs in their ways by comparing and contrasting the two novels.

    Read More

  • How Does Rip Van Winkle Relate To Self Reliance

    693 Words  | 2 Pages

    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,

    Read More

  • Shedding Light

    812 Words  | 2 Pages

    Baym, Nina, and Robert S. Levine, eds. The Norton Anthology: American Literature. 8th ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2012. Print.

    Read More

  • An Allegorical Reading of Rip Van Winkle

    1509 Words  | 4 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Rip Van Winkle and the American Dream

    649 Words  | 2 Pages

    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.

    Read More

  • Chopin’s The Story of an Hour

    1355 Words  | 3 Pages

    Baym, Nina et al. Ed. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Shorter 8th ed. New York:

    Read More

  • Transformation and Freedom in Rip Van Winkle

    719 Words  | 2 Pages

    Washington Irving's, "Rip Van Winkle" presented a tale of a "dreamer." Rip Van Winkle was a family man

    Read More

  • Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle Shapes American Culture

    1577 Words  | 4 Pages

    "Darkness...lowers upon my mind, and the times are so hard they sicken my soul," says Washington Irving in a letter to a friend (Letters 446). This statement reveals Irving's intense emotional condition, and in many ways indicates the intense social atmosphere as well as his personal conflicts, during the composition of The Sketch Book. Upon the bankruptcy of his family's fortune, of which he depended on solely for his monetary security, Irving found himself flung into the "galling mortifications of independence" (Letters 487). In response to this trauma, he sailed to England to regain his composure and hopefully secure his stake as a writer so he could provide for himself that which would keep him from "being cast homeless and pennyless on the world" (Letters 486). Within statements like these, Irving's countenance is quite apparent. Additionally, it helps to reveal the social atmosphere of the time, as well as increase one's knowledge of "Rip Van Winkle" as it is represented in The Sketch Book. And this representation holds great significance to Washington Irving's development as a person, and to American culture's struggle to define itself in a unique (non-British) way.

    Read More

  • Rip Van Winkle

    2536 Words  | 6 Pages

    "The outline for each story, although based on native history, can be found in legend and myth." Robert M. Meyers, a famous critic, said this about Washington Irving's amazing talent in writing short stories in literature. "Rip Van Winkle" is one of Washington's most famous short stories. Washington does a fantastic job in the story using the themes of martial conflict and American Revolution. Throughout the story, both seem very noticeable. "Rip Van Winkle" covers many literary elements, all of which are very noticeable to the reader. He makes them easier to point out so that the reader can have a better understanding of all the themes he covers in the story.

    Read More

  • Use Of American Myth In Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle

    721 Words  | 2 Pages

    “Rip Van Winkle” a story written by Washington Irving in the late eighteenth century is a classic example of an American myth. American myths have several distinct features. This includes being set in a past time period, being set in an isolated place and contains strange, exaggerated or even incredible characters. American myths also contain either a magical or heroic type of event. Irving’s story is set in the past in a remote location in the Catskill Mountains with strange and exaggerated characters and a magical event giving the reader feelings of both astonishment and believability.

    Read More

More about Rip Van Winkle: A Portrait of the American People Before and After the Revolution

Open Document