Tom Walker And Rip Van Winkle Analysis

Isabel Allende, a writer, once stated, “I tend to see the similarities in people and not the differences.” Many people see differences in people, not everyone or everything is the same. Washington Irving seen the similarities between Tom and Rip. Both Tom and Rip had a very lazy, but have friendly personalities. They had the similar idea of going into a wooded area to get away from their abuse and nagging wives.

We see specific similarities in the settings of both of these stories. A very spooky forest area plays a big part in the setting of both. As Tom walks through the woods he saw “oaks of great age and immense size”. The similarity of the setting in the stories that Rip Van Winkle is that he “trudged through the woods and swamps”. Both Tom and Rip explore into the woods to get away from their wives. In the “Tom and Tom Walker and Rip Van Winkle”, we see that the author Washington Irving uses similarities in setting, male protagonist, female protagonist, and mystic character.

As both characters explore into the wooded, forest area they both came to a body of water. Tom makes a voyage miles “into the interior of the country from Charles Bay”, where he discovered the Hudson River. Rip Van Winkle made a voyage up the Hudson same as Tom did to get away from their nagging wives. Tom would rather go into the dark forest area to get get away rather than feed his horse. His horse, “whose ribs were as articulate as the bars of a gridiron”, showed Tom’s laziness. However, Rip was known as the guy who had the “worst conditioned farm in his neighborhood”. Tom not only known as “lazy” he is also known as being friendly as “a universal friend of the needy”. Not only is Rip lazy, he is known as being friendly, he is a favorite among all the good wives of the village because he did what their husbands would