American Romanticism In Brom Bones And The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow

Washington Irving is known as being one of the most famous American authors in history. He has created fresh and exciting stories such as “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” “The Devil and Tom Walker,” and “Rip Van Winkle” that continue to captivate those who read them even today. In these three stories, Irving takes a stance on what the early Americas were like as he creates settings full of both mystery and wonder. His settings are symbols of both America’s mystery and potential, and he uses personification and motifs to convey this message.

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, written by Washington Irving, fits nicely into the Romanticism period due to its eloquent descriptions and detail to the nature around the village, the attention and focus on the main character and the addition of ghost stories and superstitions. These pieces come together to build a story of conflict and adventure. To further describe how all of the pieces fit together, we must first begin with the author. Washington Irving, born in 1783, was a well-traveled and well-educated young man. He dabbled in the areas of law, family business and even a diplomat for Spain but found the most success in his writing. Irving was considered the first author to write American Short Stories (Irving Biography). The two he is most well-known for is Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow was written in 1819, contains elements from light romanticism and humor (Dincer 219). The piece is about a young man by the name of Ichabod Crane whom tries to win the heart of a young lady by the name of Katrina Van Tassel. This story takes place in a small rural

Over time, a change has occurred from the typical horror story to a violent and bloody legend. The original short story " The Legend of the Sleepy Hollow" is an example of a simple, yet mysterious fable in which Ichabod Crane acts as the protagonist. Ichabod becomes the victim of the feared headless horseman after believing the superstitious tales of this spirit preying in the night. The film that is supposedly based upon the tale provides a deceiving, yet compelling title of Sleepy Hollow, as one might assume that the film is a reenactment of the short story. The film and original tale differ in that the film has blood, gore and controversy while the story depicts a

American Romanticism illustrates the first purely American literary movement that began alongside the beginning of a new nation. American Romanticism appeared in response to the rationalists, such as Ben Franklin, which the American Romantics believed to be too single-minded and not as expressive. Therefore, this literary movement turned away from the corruption of cities and the physical world and focused on nature and imagination. Washington Irving, in his stories “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Winkle”, displays characteristics of American Romanticism and creates American Romantic heroes.

The 1949 Disney Cartoon film is faithful and accurate to the Washington Irving's story , “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” Disneys 1949 cartoon was faithful and accurate to the washington Irving’s book because, Ichabod Crane was described as Tall and lanky as some of his characteristics in both Washington Irving’s book and the 1949 Disney movie. Brom Bones was the reason Ichabod had to fight for katrina. In both the movie and book Ichabod was always standing strong in the fight for katrina even though he was smaller.

Irving, a Romantic author, wrote many stories besides “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” These tales include “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Devil and Tom Walker.” Like these stories, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” takes place in early post-colonial America. This aspect greatly influences the historical and cultural backgrounds for the story. The historical backgrounds of this tale comes from post-Revolutionary war America. Because of this, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” reflects this new American society described in the physical setting of the story. The cultural background of the story is explained through the background actions of the characters. For example, Ichabod Crane stays with the parents of his students, and Ichabod Crane and Brom Bones fight for the hand of Katrina Van Tassel. These are just two examples of American culture shown in the story.

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Washington Irving is about a school teacher named Ichabod Crane who falls in love with a girl named Katrina. But, unfortunately for him another guy named Brom Bones likes her too. So, after going to a halloween party and learning about the Headless Horseman. Ichabod goes the the bridge where the horseman resides, and it (Brom Bones) chases him, he runs away from Sleepy Hollow, never to be seen there again. Ichabod has several character traits, some of them are, superstitious, fair with his students, and scared of everything.

They thought this was why it was enchanted. The main character Ichabod Crane comes to sleepy hollow to be the schoolmaster and to attempt to attract and marry Katrina Van Tassel and she was also sought after by many other men in the village especially Brom Van Brunt or more informally known as Brom Bones and he is very well liked in the village for his stellar horseback riding skills and his love for pranking. Many other men have stepped down from tring to win Katrina's heart after Brom makes them back down. Ichabod who did not back down avoided seeing Brom in person because his favorite way of intimidating was by using his physical dominance. In this story the protagonist Ichabod Crane has many character traits that keep him away from achieving his goal of marrying Katrina. They are that he is afraid, he is greedy, and he is very gluttonous, these 3 traits kept Ichabod from achieving his goal and

Does the name "Washington Irving" ring a bell? The author of the immortalized tales, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle." A man who has passed away almost two centuries ago, and still yet, a man who has paved the way for American literature. Washington Irving was born in New York, New York on April 3, 1783, and turned to writing once the family's import-export business had failed. Realizing that there would be no more means to support himself financially, Irving took up his talent and his passion as his profession. Throughout his life, Irving traveled constantly; from London, England, to Madrid, Spain, as well as the Western prairie frontiers of his homeland. His most renowned work, The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., is a Salmagundi (the title of another of his books) of essays, short stories, and tales heavily influenced by German folklore. In this collection, Irving frequently describes abstract ideas and ongoing situations with the expert use of analogies and metaphors, while expressing the inner heart of his characters with such vivid intensity that they seem to come alive. In addition, Irving proves himself a "Jack of all trades" by providing subtle satire for the amusement of the reader. By exhibiting his prodigious expertise in these numerous fields of literature, Irving establishes the fact that he is one of the greatest writers in history.

Additionally, readers quickly learn that Ichabod settles in Sleepy Hollow to become a schoolmaster for the village. However, the town does not treat Ichabod with respect or believe children should attend school. The author declares, “The scholars were hurried through their lessons without stopping at trifles; those who were nimble skipped over half with impunity...” (Irving, “Legend”). This shows that the citizens showed

intelligence. Angela Vietto, Colonial and Revolutionary American Literature Professor at Eastern Illinois University, states, “Ichabod Crane and Brom Bones certainly seem to represent distinctly different versions of masculinity” (“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”: Discussion Questions). This source supports the major conflict that occurs in the story and proves the Marxist approach to the text. Washington Irving’s Marxist approach to “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” and the conflict he created between imagination and reality, left his audience curious, and on the edge of their seats. Irving played on the desire of believing something true and throwing logic out the window throughout the text.

One of the similarities between these two types of writings includes an interest in the supernatural. However, though these writings share this feature, the authors of these stories have a much different outlook on the supernatural. The romantics tended to see supernatural beings in a positive light, just as most of the aspects in their writing. For example, in Irving’s story “Rip Van Winkle”, the main character faces the legend of Henry Hudson and his crew. “...the Kaatskill mountains had always been haunted by strange beings. That it was affirmed that the great Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the river and country, kept a kind of vigil there every twenty years, with his crew of the Half-moon;

Ichabod Crane’s adventure related in The Legend of Sleepy Hollow demonstrates where someone’s unchecked and undesirable personality traits can lead him. Washington Irving wrote “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” in 1820. The story describes how Ichabod Crane persistently frightened himself by supposing he saw and heard supernatural beings. When Crane competed with Brom Bones for a lady’s love, Bones took advantage of Ichabod Crane’s character flaws scaring him out of town by impersonating the dreaded Headless Horseman. Ichabod Crane’s greed, superstition, and fearfulness resulted in his downfall.

Ichabod Crane moved from Connecticut to teach the children in Sleepy Hollow, which was a small rural town (535). As the schoolmaster, he was well known in his community as he was a regular visitor to the homes of his students. He would help with chores at the homes of his students and was certainly up for a visit to students’ homes with pretty sisters and mothers who were talented cooks (536). “The school master is generally a man of some importance in the female circle of a rural neighborhood” (536). “also, he was a kind of travelling gazette, carrying the whole budget of local gossip from house to house” (537) “and was a perfect master of Cotton Mather’s history of New England Witchcraft, in which, by the way, he most firmly and potently believed” (537). His preferred past time was to visit with old Dutch wives of

American Romanticism was the first full-fledged literary movement that developed in the U.S. it was made up of a group of authors who wrote and published between around 1820-1860, when the U.S. was still finding it’s feet as a new nation. Although it hadn’t known any national boundaries. The basic idea for this is in Romanticism is that reason cannot explain everything. In reaction to the cult of nationality that was Enlightenment, Romanticism had searched for deeper appeals. This had led romantics to view things with a different trick that the Enlightenment thinkers. This was a time period where romantics revolted against the “age of reason”. They had celebrated nature, imagination, and intuition. Also the American Romanticism is written in