Month: January 2025

Were the detailed descriptions of the people around the two main characters equally important in the two stories Washington Irving wrote? The two stories that Irving wrote were The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and Rip Van Winkle. These two books are well known throughout America. Let’s begin with an overview of these two books. 

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow: The Legend of Sleepy Hollow is about a schoolmaster of a small town names Sleepy Hollow. His name was Ichabod Crane. Ichabod Crane is very interested in the towns ghost stories and was very superstitious. One of these stories was about the headless horseman. It is said that during the Revolutionary was, a man lost his head. Now, every night a headless horseman searches the forest of sleepy hollow searching for his head at the church. Very soon after Ichabod Crane became the schoolmaster, he met a young woman named Katrina Van Tassel. She was the only child of a very rich man named Baltus Van Tassel. Ever since Ichabod met Katrina, he tried to win her heart. It was difficult though, because Katrina had many suitors. One of them being a man named Brom van Brunt. He was the prank master of the town and  an expert horse rider. Brom tries to get rid of Ichabod and humiliate him, but none of his pranks work. One day, Katrina invites Ichabod to a party and he accepts. For the entire party, he dances with Katrina while Brom just sits in jealousy. As Ichabod goes home, he passed the supposedly haunted church. He sees a rider on a horse and calls to him to identify himself. Instead, the rider starts to chase Ichabod through the forest. Ichabod notices that the rider has no head and there is a sack on the horse, that he supposed is the riders head. Ichabod turns his horse to the bridge, because it is supposed that the horseman cannot cross the bridge. Ichabod crosses the bridge and the horseman stops. Ichabod believes he is safe, but instead the horseman throws his head at Ichabod and knocks him off his horse. The next morning, Ichabod’s horse shows up at the Van Ripper house, but Ichabod was never found. 

Rip Van Winkle: Rip van winkle is about a man named Rip van winkle. One day, Rip van winkle went for a walk in the Catskill mountains. He sees a man carrying a barrel of liquor and follows him. Winkle is led to a group of men playing ninepins who don’t say anything. Winkle drinks some of the liquor and falls asleep. When he wakes up the men are gone and he is old. He walks back to town, but doesn’t recognize anyone. He talks to them, but none of them know what happened. Soon he meets his daughter, but much older. Winkle realizes that he was asleep for twenty years. the story is confirmed by an old villager. 

Were the detailed descriptions of the people around the two main characters equally important in the two stories Washington Irving wrote? Yes. The stories were much better because of the descriptions of the main characters. 

How believable is Weems’ book on Washington? Mason Locke Weems wrote a biography on George Washington called “The Life of Washington”. Weems was also an American minister, as well as an evangelical bookseller and author. According to Google Books, “The effect of this “single, immortal, and dubious anecdote,” and others like it, has made this book one of the most influential in the history of American folklore. Originally published as an eighty-page pamphlet entitled The Life and Memorable Actions of George Washington, it quickly attained immense popularity.” So one reason that this book gained popularity so quickly was because the book was about George Washington. 

This book has many of Washingtons accomplishments in his life including times from his childhood and private life. Some of these stories are true, but there are many that aren’t, because we don’t know much about Washington. Weems probably just filled in the gaps in Washingtons life with stories to make Washington sound like a great person. How believable is Weems’ book on Washington? I don’t think that it’s very believable, but I’ll tell you some of the stories and let you decide for yourself. One of the stories is that when George Washington was just a kid, he threw a stone across the Rappahannock river. This is not believable because the Rappahannock river is over 300 Yards in length. There are some people that can do this like professional baseball players, but it is very unlikely for Washington to do this. Like I said, Many of these stories are meant to make Washington sound like a great person. Weems kept stating how Washington won every race he ran, because he was very fast. This might have been possible, but not likely. He says that the angels in Heaven love Washington and will bear him up into Heaven. This is also not true. He also tells the famous story about Washington cutting down a cherry tree, but this is just a story to teach kids about lying. 

This book is not very believable, because Weems makes Washington sound like the greatest person ever, but this isn’t true. You may have a different opinion, but this is mine. 

If I wanted to make money by writing a self-improvement book for Americans, what topic would I choose? There aren’t that much things that you can self-improve on. Knowledge character, status, and that’s about it. I would write a self-improvement book on character. I would basically just write about the Bible. Use references and state my points. The Bible has many verses about character. Verses about things like wisdom, keeping yourself pure, and everyday stuff. What does wisdom have to do with your character? Many people think that being wise is the same as being smart. It’s not. You can be the smartest person on earth, but there could still be a homeless person smarter than you. If your smart then you know a lot of things. If your wise, then you’ll apply those things to your life. 

Proverbs 6:6-8

⁶ Go to the ant, you sluggard;
    consider its ways and be wise!
⁷ It has no commander,
    no overseer or ruler,
⁸ yet it stores its provisions in summer
    and gathers its food at harvest.

These verses state that ants are wise. They don’t need someone to tell them to do thing, they just do them to survive. this is called diligence. Diligence can help improve character. There are so many other examples, this was just one. How do you keep yourself pure? There are so many movies and shows that say that peoples hearts are pure. That is so stupid. Hearts aren’t pure. If you followed your heart, then nothing good would come from it. Ephesians 6:10-18 is about the armor of God. Each piece of armor is something that you need to apply to your life. In our everyday life we need to stay away from things that we shouldn’t be around and thing like that. 

Galatians 5:22-23

²² But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, ²³ gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

If you don’t know, forbearance is another word for patience. All these things that I just talked about need to be applied to the Americans everyday life. Really everyone’s life. The hard part would be getting everyone to buy my book.