AuntShecky
10-30-2008, 02:50 PM
Irving, Hawthorne, and Halloween
In my country October 31 is a strange celebration. It’s not a “legal” holiday in the sense that the government and banks shut down and the kids get another day off from school (as if they needed another one!) Yet it is one of the most widely celebrated holidays of the year, in terms of retail sales for decorations, candy, and costumes, including -- if you can believe it -- adult sizes.
Apart from autumn’s natural beauty-- and perhaps chocolate, there’s little to like about Halloween. Some of the ways Americans mark the day make it seem like a celebration of bad taste. This year let me offer of an alternative to schlocky horror movies infested with vampires, serial killers, and slashers. I’m talking about two American short stories that are ripe for Halloween reading: “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Young Goodman Brown.”
Although Washington Irving was highly popular during his career, critics and more casual readers don’t immediately think of his name when compiling a list of great American writers of the early nineteenth century. But two of Irving’s characters are truly “iconic” (that term that gets bandied about too loosely these days): Rip Van Winkle and Ichabod Crane. Both of those stories are deeply steeped in the history, Dutch heritage, and scenic geography of New York’s Hudson River Valley, but the lore and legends are especially prominent through “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” first published in New York in 1819-1820.
Just as writers of fantasy try to maximize the “willful suspension of disbelief” by including identifiably realistic elements in their work, Irving roots this story in an actual place,Tarrytown, New York, which was given that name he tells us “by the good housewives of the adjacent country, from the inveterate propensity of their husbands to linger about the village tavern on market days.” (Hmm, I wonder if this was the inspiration for the “Sidetrack Tap” in Garrison Keillor’s Lake Woebegone.) Ichabod Crane, the village pedagogue, goes through a harrowing experience that can be frightening for some younger
readers, but mostly Ichabod is a figure of fun. He’s meant to be laughed at. Despite
his scarecrow-like appearance, he has an inflated sense of self-esteem, mainly in his
adamant belief that he has a shot with the town’s hottie, Katrina, upon whom another dashing bachelor, Brom Bones, has his eye. Ichabod’s worst flaw, however, is his
obsession with the scary local legends, especially the one about the “Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow.” With each reading of this traditional story, one can see subtle suggestions of meaning. The author has a keen eye for detail, evocative passages that approach real beauty, and most of all, a satirical view of the vagaries of human nature. Washington Irving was one of the very first American writers to use humor effectively. That the story is still funny to us in the 21st century is a tribute to Washington Irving’s unsung talent.
Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 1854 story, by contrast, is decidedly not funny but no less entertaining, as the ramifications of the theme are, to put it mildly, disturbing. “Young Goodman Brown”definitely “scares” the reader, but rather than startling us the way a monster might pop into a frame in a move, it shocks us into questioning the way we look at the world andour fellow human beings. The short story opens with the title character bidding his wife goodbye before leaving on an unspecified errand. The wife, significantly named “Faith,” also is described as wearing a bonnet with pink ribbons, the innocence of that color just as symbolic as the scarlet letter in that other famous Hawthorne work. For most of the story Goodman Brown walks along a path through the woods, the final destination of which is far more sinister than the shadowy shapes in Sleepy Hollow. Yet it’s not what Goodman Brown finds at the end of the path that is frightening, it’s who he finds there. At the end of the story, the title character is left doubting what it means to be “good,” doubting the motives and the character of his neighbors, doubting his own sanity. Young Goodman Brown is forced into a position of both judging and being judged. No less heartbreaking is the ultimately sad discovery of hypocrisy. Things are not what they seem;
nothing is what it is supposed to be. Everything that Goodman Brown has up until then held dear has been blown away, like the smoke rising above the large fire in the center of the community’s evil gathering in the woods.
Just as Ichabod Crane is a victim of his own gullibility, young Goodman Brown may be a victim of his own guilt. Both stories operate on the Imagination onthree levels: that of the respective authors, the characters, and the readers.
So, put a little imagination into your Trick or Treat bag – and have a happy Halloween!
In my country October 31 is a strange celebration. It’s not a “legal” holiday in the sense that the government and banks shut down and the kids get another day off from school (as if they needed another one!) Yet it is one of the most widely celebrated holidays of the year, in terms of retail sales for decorations, candy, and costumes, including -- if you can believe it -- adult sizes.
Apart from autumn’s natural beauty-- and perhaps chocolate, there’s little to like about Halloween. Some of the ways Americans mark the day make it seem like a celebration of bad taste. This year let me offer of an alternative to schlocky horror movies infested with vampires, serial killers, and slashers. I’m talking about two American short stories that are ripe for Halloween reading: “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Young Goodman Brown.”
Although Washington Irving was highly popular during his career, critics and more casual readers don’t immediately think of his name when compiling a list of great American writers of the early nineteenth century. But two of Irving’s characters are truly “iconic” (that term that gets bandied about too loosely these days): Rip Van Winkle and Ichabod Crane. Both of those stories are deeply steeped in the history, Dutch heritage, and scenic geography of New York’s Hudson River Valley, but the lore and legends are especially prominent through “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” first published in New York in 1819-1820.
Just as writers of fantasy try to maximize the “willful suspension of disbelief” by including identifiably realistic elements in their work, Irving roots this story in an actual place,Tarrytown, New York, which was given that name he tells us “by the good housewives of the adjacent country, from the inveterate propensity of their husbands to linger about the village tavern on market days.” (Hmm, I wonder if this was the inspiration for the “Sidetrack Tap” in Garrison Keillor’s Lake Woebegone.) Ichabod Crane, the village pedagogue, goes through a harrowing experience that can be frightening for some younger
readers, but mostly Ichabod is a figure of fun. He’s meant to be laughed at. Despite
his scarecrow-like appearance, he has an inflated sense of self-esteem, mainly in his
adamant belief that he has a shot with the town’s hottie, Katrina, upon whom another dashing bachelor, Brom Bones, has his eye. Ichabod’s worst flaw, however, is his
obsession with the scary local legends, especially the one about the “Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow.” With each reading of this traditional story, one can see subtle suggestions of meaning. The author has a keen eye for detail, evocative passages that approach real beauty, and most of all, a satirical view of the vagaries of human nature. Washington Irving was one of the very first American writers to use humor effectively. That the story is still funny to us in the 21st century is a tribute to Washington Irving’s unsung talent.
Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 1854 story, by contrast, is decidedly not funny but no less entertaining, as the ramifications of the theme are, to put it mildly, disturbing. “Young Goodman Brown”definitely “scares” the reader, but rather than startling us the way a monster might pop into a frame in a move, it shocks us into questioning the way we look at the world andour fellow human beings. The short story opens with the title character bidding his wife goodbye before leaving on an unspecified errand. The wife, significantly named “Faith,” also is described as wearing a bonnet with pink ribbons, the innocence of that color just as symbolic as the scarlet letter in that other famous Hawthorne work. For most of the story Goodman Brown walks along a path through the woods, the final destination of which is far more sinister than the shadowy shapes in Sleepy Hollow. Yet it’s not what Goodman Brown finds at the end of the path that is frightening, it’s who he finds there. At the end of the story, the title character is left doubting what it means to be “good,” doubting the motives and the character of his neighbors, doubting his own sanity. Young Goodman Brown is forced into a position of both judging and being judged. No less heartbreaking is the ultimately sad discovery of hypocrisy. Things are not what they seem;
nothing is what it is supposed to be. Everything that Goodman Brown has up until then held dear has been blown away, like the smoke rising above the large fire in the center of the community’s evil gathering in the woods.
Just as Ichabod Crane is a victim of his own gullibility, young Goodman Brown may be a victim of his own guilt. Both stories operate on the Imagination onthree levels: that of the respective authors, the characters, and the readers.
So, put a little imagination into your Trick or Treat bag – and have a happy Halloween!