The story you're about to read, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," comes from Washington Irving's very popular collection The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. Irving wrote these stories while touring Europe and borrowed some of their elements from European folklore. Headless horsemen, for example, made frequent appearances in Northern European storytelling. Traditionally, these ghostly apparitions preferred to terrorize proud, scheming people; those who dismissed the horseman as an illusion would meet a bad end.
In his classic tale, Irving uses ironic humor to relate the unfortunate fate of a country schoolmaster named Ichabod Crane. The worldly, educated Ichabod has little appreciation for the beauty and freshness of the country—except, that is, for the parts that he can eat. Along with food, Ichabod loves supernatural tales, even though they scare the wits out of him. He is particularly fascinated and horrified by the local legend of a headless horseman who terrorizes the residents of Sleepy Hollow.
As you read, you'll see how Ichabod's fear of the supernatural combines disastrously with his passionate feelings for a certain well-off farmer's daughter. First, to get used to Irving's formal style, read this description of Ichabod's place of residence, Sleepy Hollow. Use context clues to help you understand unfamiliar words, and summarize the meaning for yourself at the end of each paragraph.
A drowsy, dreamy influence seems to hang over the land, and to pervade the very atmosphere. Some say that the place was bewitched by a High German doctor, during the early days of the settlement; others, that an old Indian chief, the prophet or wizard of his tribe, held his powwows there before the country was discovered by Master Hendrick Hudson. 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 beliefs, are subject to trances and visions, and frequently see strange sights, and hear music and voices in the air. The whole neighborhood abounds with local tales, haunted spots, and twilight superstitions; stars shoot and meteors glare oftener across the valley than in any other part of the country, and the nightmare, with her whole ninefold, seems to make it the favorite scene of her gambols.
The dominant spirit, however, that haunts this enchanted region, and seems to be commander-in-chief of all the powers of the air, is the apparition of a figure on horseback, without a head. It is said by some to be the ghost of a Hessian trooper, whose head had been carried away by a cannon-ball, in some nameless battle during the Revolutionary War, and who is ever and anon seen by the country folk hurrying along in the gloom of night, as if on the wings of the wind. His haunts are not confined to the valley, but extend at times to the adjacent roads, and especially to the vicinity of a church at no great distance. Indeed, certain of the most authentic historians of those parts, who have been careful in collecting and collating the floating facts concerning this spectre, allege that the body of the trooper having been buried in the churchyard, the ghost rides forth to the scene of battle in nightly quest of his head, and that the rushing speed with which he sometimes passes along the Hollow, like a midnight blast, is owing to his being belated, and in a hurry to get back to the churchyard before daybreak.
Such is the general purport of this legendary superstition, which has furnished materials for many a wild story in that region of shadows; and the spectre is known at all the country firesides, by the name of the Headless Horseman of Sleepy Hollow.
What kind of place is Sleepy Hollow? What Romantic ideals or themes are expressed in Irving's description of the area?
Irving depicts Sleepy Hollow as an "enchanted" place in which strange, unearthly things happen. The local people are accustomed to these supernatural events and freely share tales about them. The dominant figure is the Headless Horseman, the ghost of a German trooper. In Romantic fashion, the natural world is closely connected with the spiritual or supernatural world, and simple rural folk are highly knowledgeable about these mysteries and terrors.
Now read the first half of "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." Don't worry too much if there are occasional passages that you don't completely understand. Just make sure you comprehend the plot of the story.
