1819

Dear People,

I still can’t believe that Rip Van Winkle actually slept for 20 years and then returned to his village after twenty years thinking he had only left for a day. He left the village because of his wife who never appreciated him he was a good man everybody loved him even the animals (dogs) but his wife . He got tired of the nitpickings of his wife and his only escape was to go to the outdoors which he did with his dog wolf and his gun. On one trip to the woods, Van Winkle wanders to one of the highest points in the Catskills. Fatigued from the climb, he rests, and soon the sun has started to set. He knows he will not be able to get home before dark. As he gets up, he hears a voice call his name. A shadowy figure seems to be in need of assistance, so he approaches the man, who looks very strange. He is short and square, with thick bushy hair and a grizzled beard, dressed in the antique Dutch fashion. He asks Van Winkle for help climbing higher with a keg. They reach an amphitheatre in the woods, where a lot of same looking men are bowling, which makes the environs sound like it is thundering. Although they are involved in pleasurable pursuits, they are silent and grim. The man starts to serve drinks from the keg and gestures to Van Winkle to help. He eventually takes a drink for himself. It tastes delicious, and he goes back for more and more until he is quite drunk and lies down to pass out. When he wakes up in the morning, he is anxious about what Dame Van Winkle will say about his late return. He reaches for his gun but finds that it is now rusty. Wolf also is gone and does not respond to Van Winkle’s calls. He gets up and feels quite stiff. When he tries to retrace his steps, the amphitheatre appears to have become an wall of rock, and some of the natural features of the area have changed. As he returns to his village everything is changed nothing is the same everybody is different nobody recognizes him. His wife and children are not their places he use to spend time with his friends is not their it is a complete change. He come across a familiar woman who he found out to be his daughter and he goes to live with her and her husband . Dame Van winkle has passed away recently. There is nobody to annoy him and nitpick him anymore he has reached the age where he is socially excusable for not able to do anything he has got his freedom to do whatever he wants without anybody pressuring him to provide. So what I would say is that the village  he has returned to is far more better then he was in before because now he is is free there is nobody to pressure him nobody to insult him and he is a free bird . “Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair; and his only alternative, to escape from the labor of the farm and clamor of his wife, was to take gun in hand and stroll away into the woods. Here he would sometimes seat himself at the foot of a tree, and share the contents of his wallet with Wolf, with whom he sympathized as a fellow-sufferer in persecution. ‘Poor Wolf,’ he would say, ‘thy mistress leads thee a dog’s life of it; but never mind, my lad, whilst I live thou shalt never want a friend to stand by thee! (Rip Van Winkle,” Paragraph 16) This quote is directly grounded in the story because Rip van Winkle was tired of all that insults and nitpicking his wife was doing. Rip’s only escape was to go away for a while which he did and actually ended up in a life he finds to be far more happier then it was before.