Education is changing in the fast paced world we live in. As educators and course developers we must change with the times as well. The idea of long, drawn out coursework has come to an end. The direction education is taking us is to teach a curriculum of only 2 works by American authors per class. We, as educators, must choose the most relevant and time honored courses as possible to accomplish this. The works I have chosen are “Rip Van Winkle” by Washington Irving and “Huckleberry Finn” by Mark Twain. Each of these is timeless and speaks to us from a historical standpoint. Rip Van Winkle was written by Washington Irving in 1819 and was originally published in a book of shorts called “The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. Rip Van Winkle was a popular story from this book then and remains so today. When Irving penned this story, the United States was less than 40 years old and there were still remnants of British sympathizers in the new country. This short story is full of historical content and allegorical references that make it a story for the ages and a lesson in prose that has remained relevant to this day. Irving tells the tale of a man who was a bit of the town joke. Rip was a lazy man with a nagging wife. Rip loves to be the town clown and jokester. He loves to hear the gossip at the town and be part of the crowd who tells it. He also likes to go off with his dog into the woods and hunt. It is here that our protagonist’s life changes. Rip encounters a group of elves/dwarves who ply him with their homemade liquor. Rip eventually gets so drunk he falls asleep. Only his sleep is deep. So deep, in fact, he awakens twenty years later, as though abducted by aliens and finally released (Cekot). But ... ... middle of paper ... ...k place. We should address mature subject matter with our students so that they too, can become mature. If we only teach a child children’s subject matter, we will only raise adults who think like children. References RAYMOND W. CECOT (2006). Rip Van Winkle: Twenty Years of Missing Time, A Literary Perspective. Retrieved from http://www.iraap.org/articles/ripvanwinkle.htm BRIAN J. JONES (2008). Washington Irving, An American Original. New York, New York, Arcade Publishing. QUIRK, TOM (2013). The Flawed Greatness of Huckleberry Finn. Retrieved from http://mizzoumag.missouri.edu/2013/05/the-flawed-greatness-of-huckleberry-finn/ SANCHEZ, MARY (2011). Commentary: 'Huck Finn,' the N-word and sanitizing history. Retrieved from http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/01/15/106592/commentary-huck-finn-the-n-word.html
Although some may argue that Twain’s use of vulgar language and racist ideology may be inappropriate for high school students, young readers should have the opportunity to explore the book in their own time. As for the classroom, books should only be required reading if their literary merit is indisputable and can instill important values and exceptional writing techniques. Twain’s novel does just that, videlicet characterization and a genuine setting, earning it an acclaim of one of the greatest American novels.
In Washington Irving’s work “Rip Van Winkle,” Irving demonstrates all characteristics of an American Mythology rather humorously. These characteristics affect the story attracting the attention of readers and impacting the reader’s experience of the story by relishing America’s unique attributes and values. In “Rip Van Winkle,” Irving incorporates attributes of American Mythology by setting the story in exciting pastimes, filling the story with strange and exaggerated characters, and featuring magical mysterious events.
A common idea throughout the United States is that a person is to work their hardest, notably, with some type of aspiration within their mind that they would like to achieve. With that being the case, even a virtually inescapable predicament is not considered to be a justification for the inability of achieving a personal goal or subjective goal that was passed to themselves from another person. Subsequently, within the short story “Rip Van Winkle,” the titular character has an absence of ambition within his life. Rather to hard work, he spends his days casually lazing about in the forest with his dog Wolf. As well as these actions resulting in frequent derision from his wife. Hence that Rip Van Winkle is antithetical to popular
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.
Washington Irving and Edgar Allan Poe were both writers who exemplified the writing style of the Romantic era. Both writers used their great talents to take the reader into the story. For example, Irving, in “Rip Van Winkle”, starts the story by saying, “Whoever has made a courage up the Hudson must remember the Kaatskill Mountains.” He also involves the reader in the story by taking us into the everyday lives of the Van Winkles and goes into some detail describing Rip’s “business”. Poe also demonstrates his ability to pull the reader into the story. In “The Fall of the House Usher” he uses extensive descriptions of the settings to give the reader the feeling of being there while the story is developing around them. The writers are also similar in the use of tone in their works. Irving’s use of tone in his stories is typically lighthearted, yet dramatic. This is demonstrated in “Rip Van Winkle” when Rip comes back from the “Kaatskills” and is talking to all the people in the town. There, he finds his son and daughter and asks, “Where’s your mother?” By asking this question, Irving implies both curiosity and even fear if Dame Van Winkle is still around. This humorous approach to the subject of Rip’s wife, makes light of ...
Irving Washington. "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." The Norton Anthology of American Literature. Ed. Nina Baym. 5th ed. Vol. 1. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1998. 948-69.
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,
The Adventure’s of Huckleberry Finn’s unique ability to incorporate moral lessons through satire and simmilar literary techniques prove it to be vital for High school students, especially at Rye, to read. The vast nature of things it teaches is something very rare for one book to do. It not only provides the reader with important life themes like other great novels do but it also shocks the reader to show the power of racism which makes it one of the greatest pieces of literature of all time. Just think of how different things would be if no one had read such an important book.
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.
Before I investigated Washington Irving, I pictured him as a characterless author referring to his works misjudging him. On the contrary, now afterwards I feel very different about him. I elucidate Washington Irving as an amusing writer due to his fantastic works, including ¨The Sketch Book¨, ¨History of New York¨. ¨Salmagundi¨. ¨The Broken Heart¨. and ¨Life of Washington¨. Without a doubt Washington Irving is one of the best authors of all time in
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.
Washington Irving's, "Rip Van Winkle" presented a tale of a "dreamer." Rip Van Winkle was a family man
Rip Van Winkle tells the story of a man who, on a trek into the Kaatskill mountains, mysteriously sleeps away twenty years of his life during the Revolutionary War. When he returns home, he finds that things have dramatically changed; King George no longer has control over the colonies, and many of his friends have either died or left town. At this point, the story reaches its climax, where Van Winkle realizes that his life may be forever changed.
How would you react if you fell asleep for 20 years then woke up and everything has changed. That is what happened in Rip is the iconic myth told in America, “Rip Van Winkle” by Washington Irving. In Rip Van Winkle, Irving creates an American myth that showcases early American mythology through his well planned out integration of a remote setting, a mysterious event, and a positive perspective.
Mark Twain once said, “Don’t go around saying that the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.” One should not assume that the world must give some sort of refreshment or present to oneself just because he is alive. He cannot live with the mindset of having others to do all the hard work while he doesn’t and receives credit for it. He must strive to put hard work and effort to meet his goals. Throughout Mark Twain’s life, there are many hardships and pains. However, he always pushed the troubles aside and focused on being the greatest. In Twain’s life, there is series of suffering and pain where he hit rock bottom, but he fortunately uses the suffering into his writing techniques to become one of the greatest