Discussion Topic
Characterization of Dame Van Winkle in "Rip Van Winkle"
Summary:
Dame Van Winkle in Washington Irving's "Rip Van Winkle" is depicted as a stereotypical "termagant" or "shrew," characterized by her relentless nagging and domineering nature. She is portrayed as a one-dimensional character who constantly criticizes her husband Rip for his laziness and lack of ambition, driving him to escape into the woods. Her character serves as a comic device reflecting Rip's oppressive domestic life and symbolizes the transition from colonial America to a vibrant new republic. Dame Van Winkle's death represents Rip's liberation from her overbearing influence.
How would you describe the character Dame Van Winkle in "Rip Van Winkle"?
The narrator, writing tongue-in-cheek, shows Dame Van Winkle largely as Rip sees her, which is as a shrew and a scold whom Rip tries to avoid. Dame Van Winkle is based on the medieval "type" of the fishwife, a shrilly, bossy, and domineering woman with a sharp tongue who was often the butt of jokes. Because she is a type, Mrs. Van Winkle is a one-dimensional character, characterized solely by relentless bullying of her hapless and kindly husband.
Although we are never privy to her inner thoughts, we can, however, understand how she became a shrew and a scold. Rip truly is a lackadaisical and apathetic man who lets his farm go to rack and ruin and lets his children run around in rags. He would rather be out hunting or fishing, helping neighboring housewives with small chores, or lingering and talking on the bench in front of the local...
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inn than taking responsibility for his farm or family. He leaves it to his wife to manage as she can.
The story is a parable about America's transition from an apathetic colony to a bustling, vibrant, and can-do independent republic. Rip represents the colonial mindset, content to wander aimlessly and ineffectually. It is no accident that while he sleeps, he misses the entire American revolution and founding of a vibrant new democracy. When he awakes, he is a hopeless relic of the past. It is also significant that Mrs. Van Winkle, a symbol of a world where women had to take charge, is now dead. A new order is in place, where the men are taking energetic responsibility for guiding a robust new nation.
Authors employ five methods of characterization, four of which are indirect:
- through a physical description of the character
- through the character's actions
- through the character's thoughts, feelings, and speeches
- through the comments and reactions of other characters.
Washington Irving utilizes these methods of characterization in depicting Dame Van Winkle, the "termagant" who is Rip's wife. Moreover, it is comically stereotyped portrait that is presented of her as with other such descriptors as "shrew." Truly, she typlifies the "scold" who will not allow Rip to relax and visit with people and go off hunting with his dog as he desires.
In addition, Dame Van Winkle prefigures the new country that Rip will meet after this twenty-year sleep: bustling, and loud, and disputatious in tone in confrontation with the imaginative and indolent Rip who represents Colonial America. For, Dame van Winkle views Rip and his dog in this way:
[She] regarded them as companions in idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye as the cause of his mater's going so often astray. True,...he was as courageous an animal as ever scoured the woods--but what courage can withstand the ever-during and all-besetting terrors of a woman's tongue?
Dame van Winkle is further described as having a "tart temper," and "a sharp tongue"; she is a clamorous woman from whom Rip always attempts escape, thus reducing Rip to a despair that leads Rip to a "long ramble" to the high parts of the Kaatskill Mountains.
How would you respond to Irving's characterization of Dame Van Winkle?
Dame Van Winkle (Dame is Dutch for Mrs.) is charaterized as a mean, controlling wife. Through indirect characterizations we see that the Mrs. Van Winkle finds fault in the smallest things- including his lack of money and his lack on interest in her or their children.
Rip’s sole domestic adherent was his dog Wolf, who was as much henpecked as his master; for Dame Van Winkle regarded them as companions in idleness, and even looked upon Wolf with an evil eye,
After he naps for a bit, Irving suggests that Rip Van Winkle must get up and return home to the "terrors" of daily life. The main terror seems to include his wife.
For some time Rip lay musing on this scene; evening was gradually advancing; the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the valleys; he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the village, and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the terrors of Dame Van Winkle.
By describing both Rip and the wolf as henpecked, and by describing his wife as a terror, I believe Dame Van Winkle is characterized as a mean wife. When he awakens and realizes she is gone, he is free of her and her demanding ways.