Rip Van Winkle - A Fairy TaleIn the short story "Rip Van Winkle", Washington Irving tells the story of a man who sleeps during the revolution. This story shows two ways of looking at revolutionary history, one based on myths and the other on facts. The mythical representation prevails, by popularity, over the factual representation. In the story, Rip Van Winkle wanders off into the mountains and comes across little men rolling bowling balls and drinking. Rip witnesses all of this and joins them in their drinking until he passes out. When he woke up, everything changed about the people, the city and himself. After telling his story, he becomes very popular among the townspeople, whereas before he was considered lazy. The two characters who mainly represent the opposing camps are Rip and the man with the cocked hat. The man with the cocked hat represents the factual representation. As soon as Rip enters the city, the man asks him very direct questions and expects very direct answers. If someone had asked this man where he had been for the past twenty years, he probably would have told the story of the revolution and specific battles. It's not the stories that interest him, only the facts. According to his description, “the man with the cocked hat”, armed can also mean leadership. The man was a leader, or at least an authority by the time Rip returned. Rip, on the other hand, tells a story reminiscent of a fairy tale. He talks about little men and drinking. It uses symbols to represent the history of the revolution. The community prefers the fairy tale version to the facts. This is evident through Rip's gain in popularity and common knowledge of his history. Irving writes, "and not a man, woman or child of the neighborhood, but he knew it by heart" while "the important man in the cocked hat... screwed up the corners of his mouth and shook his head - whereupon he There was a general nod throughout the assembly. This demonstrates that the community wants the revolution to take a certain form; they want it to be fun and symbolic, so Rip's version fits better. story might prefer a fairy tale, but that can be problematic The symbols in Rip's story are so far removed from actual events that it's hard to tell what some of the symbols represent...