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walks into the midst of a political debate led by “a lean, bilious-looking fellow . . . haranguing vehemently about rights of citizens—elections—members of congress—liberty—Bunker’s Hill—heroes of seventy-six—and other words, which were a perfect Babylonish jargon to the bewildered Van Winkle” (p. 84). When asked ” ‘Whether he was a Federal or Democrat,’” Rip is equally bewildered (p. 84). Irving’s story, at this point, becomes a satire on the American public’s preoccupation with political matters. The explanation for Rip’s mysterious twenty-year absence turns out to be a legend derived from New York’s Dutch colonial past. It is given by “old Peter Vanderdonk,” whom we are told was “a descendant of the historian of that name, who wrote one of the earliest accounts of the province” (p. 87). He assures the villagers of “a fact, handed down from his ancestor,” namely, that the Dutch explorer “Hendrick Hudson, the first discoverer of the river and country,” returned to Sleepy Hollow every twenty years to “keep a guardian eye upon the river, and the great city called by his name” (p. 87).

Oddly, Hudson’s protective intervention takes the form of playing nine-pins and drinking from “a stout keg” of Hollands gin. Rip, being “naturally a thirsty soul” joins in the carousing, and after repeated draughts from the flagon, “his senses were overpowered” (p. 81) and he passed out for the duration of the Revolutionary War and its political aftermath. Rip’s long nap leads him to forget—or better, to never know—the traumatic separation from the land of their fathers that marks the memories of his fellow citizens. Moreover, in the story’s conclusion, Irving cast Rip in the role of a storyteller so that his fellow citizens could share the bliss of forgetting. Loafing on the bench outside the Union Hotel, Rip tells his story to every stranger who arrives in the village and, in so doing, becomes a kind of living history that provides the younger generation with an alternative to the political turmoil of the post-Revolutionary period. He prefers “making friends among the rising generation, with whom he soon grew into great favor,” and soon becomes “reverenced as one of the patriarchs of the village, and a chronicle of the old times ‘before the war’ ” (p. 88). Those old times constitute a pre-history for the new republic free of the emotional scars of its having severed ties with England. By having Rip take up the task of the historian, Irving turns his story into an allegory of how to construct a “legendary” past, one that presents the origins of the nation as idyllic and therefore free of the political conflict that is inherently part of democracy (Horwitz, “‘Rip Van Winkle’ and Legendary National Memory;’ p. 37).

Irving grew up in a time without a history. The youngest of eight surviving children, he was born on April 3, 1783, the same year British troops formally withdrew from New York. His father, William Irving, was a merchant of moderate means, whose business fluctuated with the political climate of the newly formed nation. His mother, Sarah Sanders Irving, was a devoted wife and mother, whom Irving remembered dearly throughout his life. He was the pampered favorite of his sisters, Ann, Catherine, and Sarah, and throughout his adolescence and early adulthood, his four brothers, William, Peter, Ebenezer, and John Treat, also watched over him. He was not spoiled, but latitude was allowed him conducive to his development as an artist. With four brothers already set to work in the family business, there was no need for him to be pressured into a practical education for a career. Irving showed quick intelligence in his schooling but little discipline. Instead of applying himself to Dillworth’s Arithmetic or translations of Virgil, he was more apt to bury himself in books culled from his father’s library. He found popular travel narratives especially appealing. He absorbed The World Displayed, a collection of travel narratives, along with fictional works such as The Arabian Nights and Robinson Crusoe. His religious upbringing also left him