Ah, how glad I am that we are reading some fiction now. Don't take me wrong, I enjoyed some of the earlier selections we've read, but none quite so much as "Rip Van Winkle."
I was trying for the longest time to remember where I had first heard this story but I have succumbed to failure. I know I have never read it before but I knew the whole story line before we were assigned it in class. Who knows. It was probably some cartoon or story book I saw/read as a child and it just stuck.
I thought Irving's perspective on domestic life was quite amusing. I really enjoyed how Dame Van Winkle was painted as the villain, and then to make those connections with Irving's own life. In the introduction it said, after Irving's fiance died, he never married and that single life seemed to suite him well. Reading Rip Van Winkle makes me wonder if he was actually more happy to be single than he would have been married!
Rip Van Winkle seems to be one of those stories that is meant for children but has lines and content that only adults would get. Like Shrek (or for that matter, most animated movies today). It's obviously fantastical but at the same is very heavily rooted in symbolism. I very much appreciated the symbolism in the story, actually. I think it's a lot of fun to dig through stories like this and figure out what the author was intending. Not only that, it's just a FUN story in general!
-Photo-tinted-Resized.jpg)
I found this photo of a guy that played Rip Van Winkle in a very early film adaptation. Which lead me to this...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pelZ43T6Y3E
It's quite amusing. There's no sound because it was made in 1890 but it's more fun to add your own anyway.
I also liked Dame Van Winkle in this story. The allusion to Irving's fiance, Matilda, with Dame was, honestly, lost on me while I was reading. (I was thinking of how Irving matched Dame with England, and Rip Van Winkle with America.) But it is interesting how Dame, in her dying, freed Rip from responsibilities and how Matilda dying freed Irving. Do you think Irving intentionally put himself into this story? Or is it something that just happened as he was writing?
ReplyDeletekamie.
ReplyDeletegreat post!
i loved what you mentioned about the adult humor and symbolism in this story, as well as in so many children’s movies today – it is so true! i even find myself catching hidden, more mature humor in disney movies from when i was young. in fact, most of those films i loved so much as a child are twice as funny when i re-watch them now.
thanks for the awesome insight!
(p.s. i also loved the picture – it’s so similar to the way i pictured rip van winkle!)