Rip Van Winkle Analysis Washington Irving is very creative in the way he expresses and crafts the themes in his stories. Taking a common subject, he adds mystery and a moral lesson to make it interesting to the reader. The advancement of time and its connection to change are depicted in Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle through the main character’s transition to future years, the preserved mysterious forest, and the development of the township from past to present.
Rip Van Winkle starts out a lazy, good-natured man with no personal motivation in life, but his experiences change him into a man with a new found freedom and happiness. Because of his nagging wife, and large family to support, Rip was unable to carelessly do the things he enjoys. “If left to himself, he would whistled life away in perfect contentment; but his wife kept continuously dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness, and the ruin he was bringing on his family” (Irving 671). After venturing into the mysterious forest, and having unusual experiences, Rip found himself twenty years in
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Upon his arrival in the wooded mountains, Rip sensed that something wasn’t right. He met some mysterious creatures, drank nm unknown beverage, and joined in a big feast. “He even ventured when no eye was fixed upon him, to taste the beverage, which he found had much of the flavor of excellent Hollands”(675). After a long night, he fell into a dazzy sleep, not knowing what was in store for him. As he woke up, he sensed a difference. Although overtime the forest hadn’t changed, he sees that he has. He was perplexed with how he had changed, and confused with why the forest hadn’t. Irving gaves the forest a sort of eerie mood. There is a clear contrast in the change of Rip, and the stagnation of the woods. The magic of the woodland mountaintop kept it preserved, while at the same time it allowed Rip to
His wife would bad mouth him and yell at him, but Rip wouldn't do much
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.
Rip Van Winkle had grabbed his gun and his dog, Wolf, and headed out to the woods. He rested under a tree where evening came on quickly. As Rip was getting ready to journey back home, he heard a voice calling his name. He went to see who was calling his name. He discovered an old man carrying a keg on his back. Rip and the old man walked to a ravine in the mountain. There they found a band of odd-looking people. Rip and the old man drank from the keg the man was carrying on his back. Rip feel into a deep sleep, which bring us up to his awaking.
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,
Irving use of irony is evident throughout the story. “I have observed that he was a simple good-natured man; he was, moreover, a kind neighbor, and an obedient hen-pecked husband (Rip Van Winkle.” “Irving uses their relationship to satirize loveless marriages. Rips wife hates his laziness, and he hates her nagging
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 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.
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.
With his description the reader can deduce that all is not well with the inhabitants of the Van Winkle home. Irving continues to describe Rip as a happy go lucky type he is very helpful to others and is looked upon kindly by the towns people. Rips problem however is that what he does for others he won’t do for himself. “…his wife kept continually dinning in his ears about his idleness, his carelessness, and the ruin he was bringing on his family. Morning, noon, and night, her tongue was incessantly going, and everything he said or did was sure to produce a torrent of household eloquence” (Irving 473). The reader can construe that the domestic life for Rip Van Winkle is unbearable due in part to his nagging wife and his lack of effort when it comes to working on his own property, he apparently has no problem running errands for people or playing and spending time with kids that weren’t
In Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle, the main character Rip represents the United States. Throughout this entire story Mr. Winkle is having a tremendous amount of trouble struggling to find himself. He left home and came back to the same problems he was dealing with before he left. One of his main reasons for leaving was to get away from his nagging wife. Rip’s biggest problem was that he was very lethargic. While Mr. Winkle was a pleasant man, his laziness affected many areas in his life such as his family, the farm, and also society.
In this story, the author gives us an overall view on a life of a village in the Kaatskill mountains area. Rip Van Winkle is the central character of this story. Irving Washington builds Rip with a quite strange characteristic that makes people hard to understand. He is nice and kind in the eyes of the villages. He is not a lazy fellow; he is unafraid of hard work, he is always ready to assist everyone in his village but his own. Actually, he is really irresponsible to his family and in his wife's eyes he is the lazy and useless man.
Rip Van Winkle promptly reaches the realization that he must have unknowingly slept for almost twenty years. Throughout the short story of "Rip Van Winkle", themes of change and stasis, history and its truth, and freedom in the face of tyranny are evident throughout the entirety of the work. Although "Rip Van Winkle" is a short story, there are many instances in which changes and stasis are apparent in different ways and circumstances. Upon awakening from his slumber, Rip Van Winkle soon discovers that much of the town he knew is now gone. Rip has trouble recognizing the people of his village, to the point that the one person who he
Some aspects of Rip’s character act as a symbol for America’s journey to independence. Rip values his freedom but does not actively rebel against his wife’s control. In this case, Rip’s freedom represents the colonies freedom caused by their distance from Britain, and Rip’s wife represents Britain. Rip’s disorientation
Along the reaches of the Hudson River, not far from the Catskill Mountains, there is a small, Dutch town. The mountains overshadow the town, and there are times when the good Dutch burghers can see a hood of clouds hanging over the crests of the hills. In this small town lives a man named Rip Van Winkle. He is beloved by all his neighbors, by children, and by animals, but his life at home is made miserable by his shrewish wife. Though he is willing to help anyone else at any odd job that might be necessary, he is incapable of keeping his own house and farm in repair. He is descended from an old and good Dutch family, but he has none of the fine Dutch traits of thrift and energy.