Rip van Winkle
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Rip van Winkle is a short story by Washington Irving, as well as the name of the story's fictional protagonist. It was part of a collection of stories entitled The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon.
The story, written while Irving was staying with his sister Sarah and her husband Henry van Wart in Birmingham, England, is set in the days before and after the American Revolutionary War. A villager of Dutch descent escapes his nagging wife by wandering into the forest. After various adventures, he settles down under a shady tree and falls asleep. He wakes up 20 years later and returns to his village. He immediately gets into trouble when he hails George III, not knowing that in the meantime the American Revolution has taken place and he is not supposed to be a loyal subject of the Hanoverian any longer.
After this story, "Rip van Winkle" can be a reference to a person who sleeps a long time, or to a person who is inexplicably unaware of current events.
Adaptations
Ripvanwinkle.jpg
The story has been adapted for other media for the last two centuries, from stage plays to cartoons to films. Actor Joseph Jefferson was most associated with the character on the 19th century stage and made a series of films starring the character starting in 1896, the earliest of which is in the US National Film Registry. Jefferson's son Thomas followed in his father's footsteps and also played the character in a number of early 20th century films.
The story contains a "Note 1" at the end, but this was not included in the original first edition.
See also
- Seven Sleepers of Ephesus
- sleeping heroes
- Woody Allen's Sleeper
- Rip Van Wink from The Beano
External links
- "Rip Van Winkle, a Posthumous Writing of Diedrich Knickerbocker" (http://www.bartleby.com/310/2/1.html)
- Irving in Birmingham (http://www.birmingham.gov.uk/irving)
- Template:Imdb titleja:リップ・ヴァン・ウィンクル