Now try analyzing Irving's artful uses of language in another passage from "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." Read the passage below and then answer the questions beside the the passage.
What is the effect of referring to Ichabod and his borrowed horse as "hero and steed"?
To what does Irving compare the horse's temperament?
How does Irving use figurative language to paint a comical picture of Ichabod?
In Irving's Romantic tale, who is afforded more dignity and respect—Ichabod or his rival Brom Van Brunt? How does Irving portray each character, generally?
How does the difference between the characters of Ichabod and Brom present a Romantic theme or ideal?
| Your Responses | Sample Answers |
|---|---|
| The effect is comical because the awkward Ichabod is no "hero" and the broken-down horse is no "steed." | |
| He compares the horse to a devil. | |
| He compares Ichabod's elbows to a grasshopper's and the motion of his arms to the flapping of wings. The comparison of Ichabod's whip to a king's scepter completes the comical picture of an awkward attempt at dignity. | |
| Ichabod is portrayed as a buffoon, someone readers are encouraged to laugh at, while Brom is cool and charming but also more passionate than Ichabod. Brom's emotions are easily stirred and acted upon, while Ichabod is reluctant to show his feelings, and Brom gets the better of Ichabod. | |
| Ichabod is an intellectual person from the city, not one of the local young men from the rural area where he teaches. Ichabod is most often ridiculed in the story, suggesting that his reliance on intellect is less useful and admirable than the locals' tendency to rely on hunches, passions, and a belief in the supernatural. The rural "folk" are more in touch with their feelings and intuitions, and they fare better than the scholar Ichabod. | |
That he might make his appearance before his mistress in the true style of a cavalier, he borrowed a horse from the farmer with whom he was domiciliated, a choleric old Dutchman of the name of Hans Van Ripper, and, thus gallantly mounted, issued forth like a knight-errant in quest of adventures. But it is meet I should, in the true spirit of romantic story, give some account of the looks and equipments of my hero and his steed. The animal he bestrode was a broken-down plow-horse, that had outlived almost everything but its viciousness. He was gaunt and shagged, with a ewe neck, and a head like a hammer; his rusty mane and tail were tangled and knotted with burs; one eye had lost its pupil, and was glaring and spectral, but the other had the gleam of a genuine devil in it. Still he must have had fire and mettle in his day, if we may judge from the name he bore of Gunpowder. He had, in fact, been a favorite steed of his master's, the choleric Van Ripper, who was a furious rider, and had infused, very probably, some of his own spirit into the animal; for, old and broken-down as he looked, there was more of the lurking devil in him than in any young filly in the country.
Ichabod was a suitable figure for such a steed. He rode with short stirrups, which brought his knees nearly up to the pommel of the saddle; his sharp elbows stuck out like grasshoppers'; he carried his whip perpendicularly in his hand, like a sceptre, and as his horse jogged on, the motion of his arms was not unlike the flapping of a pair of wings. A small wool hat rested on the top of his nose, for so his scanty strip of forehead might be called, and the skirts of his black coat fluttered out almost to the horses tail. Such was the appearance of Ichabod and his steed as they shambled out of the gate of Hans Van Ripper, and it was altogether such an apparition as is seldom to be met with in broad daylight.
