The story under consideration “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”
is written byWashington Irving. The author is a famous American writer who achieved international
fame for his fictional works, including the stories Rip Van Winkleand The
Legend of Sleepy Hollow, as well as for his biographies and historical
writings. Although he became a best-selling author, he never really fully
developed as a literary talent, he has retained his reputation as the first
American man of letters. Irving also advocated for writing as a legitimate
career, and argued for stronger laws to protect writers from copyright
infringement.
“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” is the
story of Ichabod Crane, a sycophantic, lean, lanky, and extremely superstitious
schoolmaster from Connecticut, who competes with Abraham "Brom Bones"
Van Brunt, the town rowdy, for the hand of 18-year-old Katrina Van Tassel, the
daughter and sole child of a wealthy farmer, Baltus Van Tassel. As Crane leaves
a party he attended at the Van Tassel home on an autumn night, he is pursued by
the Headless Horseman, who is supposedly the ghost of a Hessian trooper who had
his head shot off by a stray cannonball during "some nameless battle"
of the American Revolutionary War, and who "rides forth to the scene of
battle in nightly quest of his head". Ichabod mysteriously disappears from
town, leaving Katrina to marry Brom Bones, who was "to look exceedingly
knowing whenever the story of Ichabod was related". Although the nature of
the Headless Horseman is left open to interpretation, the story implies that
the Horseman was really Brom Bones in disguise.
The story is set in the small Dutch village, untouched by
the outside world, in 1790. It was a …” small market town or rural port, which
by some is called Greensburgh, but which is more generally and properly known
by the name of Tarry Town. This name was
given, we are told, in former days, by the good housewives of the adjacent
country, from the inveterate propensity of their husbands to linger about the
village tavern on market days…” The setting of the story is realistic. It is
presented in detailed way. It provides the background for action and
contributes to our understanding of characters :“…from the listless repose of
the place, and the peculiar character of its inhabitants, who are descendants
from the original Dutch settlers, this sequestered glen has long been known by
the name of Sleepy Hollow, and its rustic lads are called the Sleepy Hollow
Boys throughout all the neighboring country. A drowsy, dreamy influence seems
to hang over the land, and to pervade the very atmosphere…”
From the point of view of presentation, the story is the 3rd
person narrative.
The characters we meet in the story under analysis are
Ichabod Crane, Brom Bones, Katrina Van Tassel, The Headless Horseman and other
citizens of the Sleepy Hollow. The writer reveals Ichabod Crane through his
appearance, actions and preferences.
He was a "... native of Connecticut, a State which supplies the
Union with pioneers for the mind as well as for the forest, and sends forth
yearly its legions of frontier woodmen and country schoolmasters. The cognomen of Crane was not inapplicable to
his person. He was tall, but exceedingly
lank, with narrow shoulders, long arms and legs, hands that dangled a mile out
of his sleeves, feet that might have served for shovels, and his whole frame
most loosely hung together. His head was
small, and flat at top, with huge ears, large green glassy eyes, and a long
snipe nose, so that it looked like a weather-cock perched upon his spindle neck
to tell which way the wind blew..."
Ichabod Crane is an anti-hero in that he is the tale’s
protagonist and has some good qualities, but his serious character flaws make
him not admirable—and these flaws will doom him. He is a schoolmaster, but he
does not seem particularly interested in his students, and he is only
well-educated relative to the others in the town, having finished a few books.
The only one he seems to focus on is Cotton Mather’s History of New England
Witchcraft. He is obsessed with the supernatural apart from religious faith,
despite his learning. This in itself is not enough to make him foolish, but he
fails to realize that he is the agent of his own undoing in that he makes
himself scared just to walk home at night. One of his sources of pleasure was
"...to pass the long winter evenings with the old Dutch wives… listening
to their marvelous tales of ghosts and goblins…"
He was a huge feeder, and according to country custom…
boarded and lodged at the houses of farmers whose children he instructed.
Ichabod had a soft and foolish heart, and it was not a wonder that such a
tempting woman soon found favor in his eyes. When it came to his rival, Brom
Bones, Ichabod had a happy mixture of pliability and perseverance in his
nature, yet still became the object of whimsical persecution to Bones and his
gang of rough riders.
Brom Bones was introduced as was a burly, roaring,
roistering blade of the name of Abraham. He was broad shouldered and
double-jointed, with short, curly black hair and a bluff but not unpleasant
countenance, having a mingled air of fun and arrogance. From his Herculean
frame and great powers of limb, he received the nickname Brom Bones, by which
he was universally known. He was foremost at all races. He was always ready for
either a fight or a frolic, but had more mischief than ill will in his
composition; and with all his overbearing roughness, there was a strong dash of
waggish good humor at bottom. He had three or four boon companions who regarded
him as their model and at the head of whom he scoured the country, attending
every scene of feud or merriment for miles around.
This reckless hero had for some time singled out the
blooming Katrina for the object of his gallantries.
Katrina Van Tassel was a daughter and only child of a
prosperous Dutch farmer. She was a blooming lass of fresh eighteen; plump as a
partridge; ripe an melting and rosy cheeked as one of her father’s peaches; and
universally famed, not merely as a beauty, but as an heiress. She was a little
of a coquette, as might be perceived even in her dress, which was a mixture of
ancient and modern fashions,as most suited to set off her charms. She wore the
ornaments of pure yellow gold, which her great-great-grandmother had brought
over from Saardam; the tempting stomacher of the olden time, and withal a provokingly
short petticoat, to display the prettiest foot and ankle in the country round.
The Headless Horseman was depicted by Irving as “…the
dominant spirit, however, that haunts this enchanted region, and seems to be
commander-in-chief of all the powers of the air, is the apparition of a figure
on horseback, without a head. It is said by some to be the ghost of a Hessian
trooper, whose head had been carried away by a cannon-ball, in some nameless
battle during the Revolutionary War, and who is ever and anon seen by the
country folk hurrying along in the gloom of night, as if on the wings of the
wind. His haunts are not confined to the valley, but extend at times to the
adjacent roads, and especially to the vicinity of a church at no great
distance. Indeed, certain of the most authentic historians of those parts, who
have been careful in collecting and collating the floating facts concerning
this spectre, allege that the body of the trooper having been buried in the
churchyard, the ghost rides forth to the scene of battle in nightly quest of
his head, and that the rushing speed with which he sometimes passes along the
Hollow, like a midnight blast, is owing to his being belated, and in a hurry to
get back to the churchyard before daybreak. Such is the general purport of this
legendary superstition, which has furnished materials for many a wild story in
that region of shadows; and the spectre is known at all the country firesides,
by the name of the Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow…”
The plot of the story runs as follows: 1) exposition
(description of Sleepy Hollow, introduction of main and additional characters,
presenting myths and beliefs of the citizens); 2) rising action (the author
tells about Ichabod’s dreams about rich life what could be granted after the
marriage with Katrina Van Tassel, but his rival Brom Bones has also chosen the
young lady for his gallantries, here comes the romantic conflict); 3) climax
(Ichabod gets rejected by Katrina and while riding home is pursued by the
Headless Horseman); 4) anticlimax ( after Ichabod
disappears, no one makes fuss about it; Brom Bones and Katrina Van Tassel are
getting married and the town gets back to its ordinary rural life).
In order to portray the characters and to portray the
setting vividly and convincingly the author of the story resorts to the
following stylistic devices:
I. Irony Irving made fun of Ichabod’s way of living,
ridiculed his passion for scary stories, his “animal appetite”, even his
school, where our hero felt as a king: …”Ichabod, in pensive mood, sat
enthroned on the lofty stool from whence he usually watched all the concerns of
his little literary realm. In his hand he swayed a ferule, that sceptre of
despotic power; the birch of justice reposed on three nails behind the throne,
a constant terror to evil doers, while on the desk before him might be seen
sundry contraband articles and prohibited weapons, detected upon the persons of
idle urchins, such as half-munched apples, popguns, whirligigs, fly-cages, and
whole legions of rampant little paper gamecocks…” In addition, the author
ironically described women : “All these, however, were mere terrors of the
night, phantoms of the mind that walk in darkness; and though he had seen many
spectres in his time, and been more than once beset by Satan in divers shapes,
in his lonely perambulations, yet daylight put an end to all these evils; and
he would have passed a pleasant life of it, in despite of the Devil and all his
works, if his path had not been crossed by a being that causes more perplexity
to mortal man than ghosts, goblins, and the whole race of witches put together,
and that was—a woman”.
Furthermore, Irving mocks at the rural life of that time: ”
…the most enviable and admirable house in the village appears to be festooned
with dried apples, peaches and red peppers and decorated with shining
conch-shells, colored bird's eggs and a great ostrich egg …hung from the center
of the room”.
As a vivid example of irony I would like to mention the
Ichabod’s dance at Van Tassel’s house: “he was clattering about the room in such a way that you would have thought
Saint Vitus himself… was figuring before you…”
II. Metaphors “As Ichabod approached this fearful tree, he
began to whistle; he thought his whistle was answered; it was but a blast
sweeping sharply through the dry branches”. ("sweeping" is a
metaphor; it compares the sound of the wind to the sound of a broom)
“His terror rose to desperation; he rained a shower of kicks
and blows upon Gunpowder, hoping by a sudden movement to give his companion the
slip; but the spectre started full jump with him”. (Ichabod's kicking of the
horse is compared to a violent raindstorm.)
III. Similies 1. “The hour was as dismal as himself”. (the
hour is personified or compared to a person as "dismal" as Ichabod
Crane after he leaves the party, having been bested by Bram Bones)
2. “Now and then, too, the long-drawn crowing of a cock,
accidentally awakened, would sound far, far off, from some farmhouse away among
the hills—but it was like a dreaming sound in his ear”. (the unreality of the
sound is compared to a dream)
3. “Icabod had a long snipe nose, so that it looked like a
weather-cock perched upon his spindle neck”.
4. "The guttural twang of a bull frog, from a
neighbouring marsh, as if sleeping uncomfortably, and turning suddenly in his
bed".
IV. Personification
Describing a cock, as “a husband, a warrior, and a fine gentleman”.
"And how often was he thrown into complete dismay by
some rushing blast, howling among the trees..."
V. Allusions “From his Herculean frame and great powers of
limb he had received the nickname of BROM BONES”; “To have taken the field
openly against his rival would have been madness; for he was not a man to be
thwarted in his amours, any more than that stormy lover, Achilles”; It was
suddenly interrupted by the appearance of a negro in tow-cloth jacket and
trowsers, a round-crowned fragment of a hat, like the cap of Mercury, and
mounted on the back of a ragged, wild, half-broken colt, which he managed with
a rope by way of halter”; and haunted bridges, and haunted houses, and
particularly of the headless horseman, or Galloping Hessian(historic
reference) of the Hollow, as they
sometimes called him”.
Summing up the analysis of the given extract one should say
that the writer Washington Irving brilliantly uses irony and humor to create
graceful, light and natural prose. Irony is a recurring feature in Washington
Irving's writings, but maybe never so noticeably as in pseudo-supernatural
stories. The author appears to be not only a keen word-lover but also a gifted
ironist, who uses all the possible literature devices to create the atmosphere
full of action in his witty and light romantic stories.
