Discussion Topic

"Rip Van Winkle" Allegory and Symbolism

Summary:

"Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving is a symbolic tale reflecting the changes brought by the American Revolution. Rip symbolizes the past, representing the unchanged world of pre-revolutionary America, while the transformation of the inn into a bustling hotel symbolizes societal shifts towards democracy. The story, though fictional, uses allegory to critique these transformations, with characters like Rip and his dog, Wolf, embodying the old world. Names and elements like the ghost of Henry Hudson add layers of historical and cultural symbolism, blending fantasy with reality.

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What does Rip Van Winkle symbolize?

Rip Van Winkle is very much a symbol of the past. He represents that world of the Catskill Mountains that used to exist prior to the outbreak of the Revolutionary War but which has changed beyond recognition in the twenty years that Rip has been asleep. Life may have changed, but Rip has not. He's a living, breathing artifact of history, a figure from a vanished Dutch colonial past.

As such, he becomes the object of curiosity and fascination among the villagers. They don't know quite what to make of this strange man with the long beard who claims to be a subject of King George III. But the villagers soon warm to the stranger in their midst—and to most of them he is a stranger, even though he's lived his whole life in the village—which makes life easier for Rip. Once he's been accepted, he can go back to his former life of easeful idleness, which was taken to extreme lengths in his two-decades-long slumber.

That the villagers should have accepted Rip is a sign that they've come to terms with the past—the pre-revolutionary past, to be precise. Although the United States is still a young country when Rip wakes up from his enchanted sleep, the people value their history, and it's important for them to preserve their past. That said, life has moved on, and the historical era that Rip represents has gone for good.

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Is "Rip Van Winkle" a true story?

“Rip Van Winkle” is not a true story but a work of fiction by Washington Irving, who included the tale in his collection The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. In the story, however, Rip Van Winkle’s experiences are presented as true events by the fictional historian Diedrich Knickerbocker, whose papers have supposedly come into the possession of Irving’s fictional narrator, the titular Geoffrey Crayon.

Readers at the time would have recognized Diedrich Knickerbocker as an unreliable source from Irving’s satirical 1809 book, A History of New York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty, of which Knickerbocker was the purported author. By framing “Rip Van Winkle” as a story recorded by an untrustworthy (and invented) historian, Irving clues readers in to the fact that Rip’s story is fiction. In a satirical note to readers at the end of the story, Crayon mentions that although the tale would seem to be based on an old German legend, Knickerbocker’s notes confirm Rip’s story as “absolute fact,” told with the historian’s “usual fidelity”—that is, none at all. Crayon then presents Knickerbocker’s own supposed argument for the story’s truthfulness:

“The story of Rip Van Winkle may seem incredible to many, but nevertheless I give it my full belief, for I know the vicinity of our old Dutch settlements to have been very subject to marvellous events and appearances. Indeed, I have heard many stranger stories than this, in the villages along the Hudson; all of which were too well authenticated to admit of a doubt. I have even talked with Rip Van Winkle myself, who, when last I saw him, was a very venerable old man, and so perfectly rational and consistent on every other point, that I think no conscientious person could refuse to take this into the bargain; nay, I have seen a certificate on the subject taken before a country justice, and signed with cross, in the justice’s own handwriting. The story, therefore, is beyond the possibility of doubt.”

Taking into account Knickerbocker’s unreliability as a narrator, as well as the fantastical nature of Irving’s tales, these claims add humor to the narrative and signal to readers that they should regard the story of Rip Van Winkle with skepticism at best.

The tale does, however, reference a number of real places, people, and events—including the Catskill Mountains of New York, the Dutch explorer Hendrick (Henry) Hudson, and the American Revolution—and these details allow Irving to blur the borders between fantasy and reality. In particular, descriptions of the Catskills as "fairy mountains" and Rip's hometown as "a village of great antiquity" (along with, of course, the fantastical nature of Rip’s experiences themselves) lend the story the feel of a genuine American folk tale. In the “D.K. POSTSCRIPT” that concludes the tale, Knickerbocker notes that the Catskills have “always been a region full of fable” and recounts a local Indigenous legend about the Manitou, a spirit said to dwell in the mountain wilds. Irving thereby places “Rip Van Winkle” in a rich and timeless folkloric tradition, imparting a sense of authenticity to the story at the same time as he indicates that it is a product of imagination rather than fact.

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What are some symbols in "Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving?

One of the most mysterious persons in the story is a man who carries a keg up a mountain and asks Rip to help. Rip notices that he is dressed as a 17th century Dutchman. When they arrive in a meadow, one of the men is addressed as "Commander". It is after that scene that Rip drinks some of the liquor and falls asleep for 20 years. So, who were those people and who was the commander? After Rip awakens, someone tells him that the ghost of Henry Hudson, who discovered the New York area where the story takes place, comes back every 20 years to haunt the place. This implies that the men were part of Hudson's crew and the commander was the ghost of Hudson, a symbol of adventure and discovery. Rip certainly has an adventure and discovers much about the future after he wakes up.

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What are some symbols in "Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving?

An example of a symbol in "Rip Van Winkle" would be the Union Hotel that replaces the Inn after the Revolutionary War. The Inn, with its sleepy owner and picture of King George III, symbolizes the passivity and inactivity of the time when the United States was a set of colonies under British rule. It is a symbol of inactivity because the narrator tells us Rip Van Winkle goes there to join "idle personages" in the village and talk "about nothing." In contrast, the new Union Hotel that replaces the Inn is a place that symbolizes the energy and patriotism in the new nation. The tree the old inn's owner use to sit under has been replaced by a flagpole flying the stars and stripes of the American flag and a picture of General Washington has replaced George III. The men inside are busily debating the upcoming presidential election, not simply sitting around sharing old news. Words describing what is going on inside the Union Hotel like "bustling" and talk of "rights of citizens ... elections" show the patriotic energy of the new nation. 

In a nutshell: the Inn is a symbol of the sleepy, passive times before the American Revolution. The Union Hotel, with its American flag, portrait of Washington and busy people inside is a symbol of the new energy of the new country. 

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What are some symbols in "Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving?

Let us remember that a metaphor is a form of comparison, an example of figurative language, that does not use the word "like" or "as." If we have a careful look at the story, one of the first metaphors that I can spot is used to describe the marriage of Rip Van Winkle and how having a "termagant wife" can impact a husband:

Their tempers, doubtless, are rendered pliant and malleable in the fiery furnace of domestic tribulation; and a curtain lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the virtues of patience and long-suffering.

Note how the marriage is compared to a "fiery furnace of domestic tribulation," clearly identifying the kind of troublesome nature of Rip's marriage and the way that he is being painfully refined because of his status as a "hen-pecked husband."

Symbols are objects, actions or characters that stand both for their literal meaning but also come to suggest some other symbolic meaning. A great example of a symbol in this excellent story is Rip himself, who is shown to be unaffected by the massive turbulent historical events that he has missed in his sleep. In fact, through the use of Rip symbolically, Irving manages to suggest that not that much has changed actually in essentials over the course of Rip's enchanted sleep. Note how Rip is described in the following quote:

Rip, in fact, was no politician; the changes of states and empires made but little impression on him; but there was one species of despotism under which he had long groaned, and that was—petticoat government.

Note the irony and humour of this comment. Irving effectively manages to write off the Revolution and the massive changes that accompanied it by stating that the oppression of men as experienced by them in their marriage is a far worse form of political existence than either before or after the Revolution.

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What does Rip Van Winkle's wolf represent?

Wolf is the name of Rip Van Winkle's dog. In many ways, I'd suggest that Wolf represents Winkle's life back in the colonial era, lost forever after his long sleep, and the changes that have reshaped the former colonies, now United States, in that time. After all, Wolf plays a role on both sides of that divide.

Before Winkle's sleep, Wolf is Rip's loyal companion and joint-sufferer under his wife's force of personality. When Rip Van Winkle awakens from his sleep, it is to find a radically changed world, which he has severe difficulties re-assimilating into. This difficulty is reflected in his encounter with his dog—or at least in his encounter with what he believes to be his dog. He finds that Wolf has changed dramatically in the years where Rip was gone. The dog, now described as "half-starved" and a "cur," shows hostility to Rip.

Wolf's change reflects the larger changes which have shaped this transition from the colonial era to the post-Revolutionary War United States. Rip Van Winkle's past has been lost to him, much like the Wolf he remembers.

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Is "Rip Van Winkle" by Washington Irving an allegory?

Certainly, the American Revolution is pivotal to the meaning of "Rip van Winkle." For, Irving's tale reveals his feelings towards the New Englanders that he considers Purtanical intruders who virtually invade the quiet and peaceful Dutch New York. This disturbance of the bucolic beauty of the Kaatskill Mountains and the surrounding areas is allegorically depicted by the "odd-looking personages playing at ninepins." The grave-faced men with "lackluster countenances" who play at their game with a mysterious silence have the most somber of visages. The balls of the ninepins symbolize cannon balls and the thunder is the explosion of the artillery of cannons.

As it turns out Rip later learns that the little men he sees are the ghosts of Henry Hudson's crew, the men who have discovered the Hudson River. Further, Rip's experience of ghosts of the more Romantic past are set in sharp contrast to his awakening twenty years later and his reutrn to the village where he has lived. As he reaches the edge of the village, Rip is "sorely perplexed" by all the strange faces and the "bustling disputatious tone" to the character of the people who are assembled there. Gone is the appreciation for the beauty of nature and the desultory atmosphere of the old inn where George III's portrait resided, as the crowd argues about Tories, Congress, and President Washington. In short, Rip van Winkle finds himself an outcast in his own village and an anachronism.

There is little doubt, then, that Washington Irving's "Rip van Winkle" acts as a humorous tale, but it also is an allegory, an extended metaphor for the invasion of harsh and radical changes to the peace and pastoral beauty of a Colonial village from which van Winkle, who represents the Romantic, the lover of nature and the contemplative life, has been taken. Confronted by the new republic, van Winkle is frightened and feels alienated. His nostalgia for the past is satisfied later, however, as once his wife dies and he is away from "the tyranny of Dame Van Winkle," Rip resumes his desultory but more natural life.

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Do the characters' names in "Rip Van Winkle" have any symbolic meaning?

This is by no means a definitive answer, but it has been suggested that Rip in Rip Van Winkle is a reference to R.I.P, a common acronym for Rest In Peace, or Requiescat In Pace, in the original Latin. If this was indeed Irving's intention in naming his protagonist, it would be entirely appropriate, for Rip is pretty much a figure of a long dead, vanished past.

When old Rip wakes up from his extensive slumbers, it's almost as if he's come back from the dead. (And of course sleep is frequently used in literature as a metaphor for death.) Rip's alive of course, but there's still something not quite of this world about him. The villagers treat him like a walking exhibit from a museum, a living relic of the past. One could reasonably argue that Rip's so out of place in this new era, where absolutely nothing makes sense, that something in him died the day he went to sleep. So his name—if indeed it is a reference to R.I.P.—is a permanent reminder of the spiritual death he suffered when he dozed off beneath a tree on that fateful day.

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