Rip Van Winkle | Historical Context

Becoming a Nation
Washington Irving was born in 1783, the year that the American Revolution was formally ended by the Treaty of Paris. His parents had been born in England but Irving was among the first generation of people to know from birth that they were not British subjects, but Americans. The nation was still new, and in many ways unformed. It was not yet clear what the Revolution meant and how the new country would be different from the old colonies. Irving wrestled with this question in ‘‘Rip Van Winkle,’’ by having his characters hotly debate political change...

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