Amy Irving

battle that requires brain, brawn, or simply charm to attain victory. “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” a short story written by Washington Irving in the aftermath of the Revolutionary War, examines not only the literal battlefield of warfare, but also the perceived battlefield of everyday life or the universal theme of battle. In “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” Irving uses vivid war-like imagery, tone, and plot to relay to the reader the battles faced by his characters in various aspects of life…

In his work A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving delves into the fundamentals of faith through his narrator, Johnny Wheelwright, and Johnny’s best friend Owen Meany. Johnny and Owen are best friends as they grow up in Gravesend. Owen and Johnny spend nearly every waking minute with each other, often at Johnny’s grandmother’s house. During one of their many childhood sleepovers, Owen comes down with a fever. After Owen wakes Johnny up, Johnny sends him down the hall to his mother’s room. Johnny’s…

The American short story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” was written while Washington Irving was living in England. Washington Irving wanted the film audience to capture a gothic tone that mirrors a slightly surreal place. Throughout the text, Irving describes Sleepy Hollow as, “Certain it is, the place still continues under the sway of some witching power, that holds a spell over the minds of the good people, causing them to walk in a continual reverie. They are given to all kinds of marvelous…

“Rip Van Winkle”, written by Washington Irving, is about a man in colonial America named Rip Van Winkle, who falls asleep in the Catskill Mountains and wakes up twenty years later, having missed the American Revolution. The setting of “Rip Van Winkle” is in New York before and after the American Revolution. Irving uses historical allegory to create an American Romantic folktale that strengthens the national identity of the newly formed country. The main character and protagonist of the story is…

The year was 1997. Rip Van Winkle is lying in bed and dreading going to work. Rip was pay phone technician with Bellsouth. He was rather lazy so this job suited him perfectly. All he had to do was drive around and repair pay phones and collect the money. Rip had been married for fifteen years. During these fifteen years, he had been bossed around daily by his wife. Today wasn’t any different. His wife, Dame Van Winkle, stormed into the bedroom and demanded that he get up. Rip replied to her in…

Throughout the novel A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving writes a story about two boys growing up and learning the works of the world. The protagonist, John Wheelwright, is narrating the book about his life as an adult and sharing details about his childhood. In his childhood, he writes about his closest companion, Owen Meany. Owen leads John to become an anti-American, pessimistic, all girls private school teacher in Canada. As John is going through college and Owen is serving the Vietnam war…

Washington Irving was one of the best fiction writers of the early nineteenth century. He was the first American fiction writer to obtain an international reputation. He was also named for George Washington, the first president. Irving wrote “The Devil and Tom Walker” in the early nineteenth century, and the story took place in 1727. The story’s point of view was in the third person. The story’s setting took place at Charles Bay, near Boston Massachusetts. In “The Devil and Tom Walker” it is…

God’s Instrument After years of typing away on his antique typewriter for hours on end, the Oscar winning storyteller John Irving triumphantly finished his seventh novel A Prayer For Owen Meany in 1989. The emotional tugging that the novel forces upon its audience made it one of the most read novels of the 20th century (McCarthy 2). This humorous yet heart wrenching tale tells of an unlikely friendship between two boys just before the Vietnam era. As a time full of war, death, and lost hope;…

A Life of Selfishness and Greed The author of “The Devil and Tom Walker”, Washington Irving, became a famed author of 19th century America. He was born in New York and became one of the first American fiction authors to gain international acclaim. Irving began his career writing satire essays, and he was specifically known for his works, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Winkle.” In his work “The Devil and Tom Walker”, he tells the story of a man and woman whose greed was to such an…

Assignment Option 1: Single Character Analysis “Two Kinds” is a chapter in the book “The Joy Luck Club”, written by Amy Tan in 1989. The story, which somewhat mirrors Amy Tan’s own childhood and upbringing, tells of the difficulties in mother-daughter relationships, specifically the conflict between a Chinese immigrant mother, Mrs. Woo, and her American-born daughter, Jing-mei. In the story, we quickly learn that Mrs. Woo believes that America is the “land of opportunity” and feels…