Running head: RIP VAN WINKLE AND ANTON ROSICKY 1

Rip Van Winkle and Anton Rosicky

Gloria Quintana

Professor Jennifer Ares

Southeastern College
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Abstract

“Rip van Winkle” and “Neighbor Rosicky” are amazing stories of two generous and kind Formatted: Indent: First line: 0.49"

men. Washington Irving's story, “Rip Van Winkle”, is the story of a man who mysteriously

sleeps for 20 years to find himself in a changed world. Rip Van Winkle is always attentive to

help other people but never to his wife, Dame Van Winkle, who is constantly nagging him about

his greatest weakness: that he cannot find any motivation to do a profitable job of any kind.

Although he is happy to help with properties that are not his own, he avoids work on his farm

and his land is severely damaged. Willa Cather's Neighbor Rosicky is the story of Anton

Rosicky, a man who faces death when his doctor tells him that he has a weak heart. He is the

representation of a rancher whose loyalty, honesty and deep passion helps him achieve an

important and joyful life for himself and his family. Although Van Winkle and Rosicky have

many similarities, the differences in the stories are very important and help see new point views

of the characters. When comparing the lifestyles, feelings, and actions of both characters, a new

interpretation of them can be observed. It shows that certain aspects of each story are more

relevant.
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Rip Van Winkle and Anton Rosicky

Washington Irving’s “"Rip Van Winkle”" is one of the best-known short stories in

American literature. He Rip lived in a town with his whole family and had a wife who was

always criticizing him. Rip decides to run away from his wife's distress by going into the forest

to hunt with his dog, Wolf. In the mountains, strange-looking men offered him to have a drink

and he fell asleep for 20 twenty years and awakens to a greatly changed world and a long beard.

His wife was dead, his children were grown up and nothing in town seemed familiar. He slowly

adapted to his new life and continually repeated his story so that the past would be remembered

and appreciated. Neighbor Rosicky is a great story of a worker immigrant's journey and the

meaning of his life. Anton Rosicky was a hard-working man all his life and always did his best

to make a good life for him and his family. He was from Czechoslovakia but moved to the

United States to become a tailor. In New York, he worked as a tailor, saving money to eventually

move to a farm in Nebraska. On the farm, he lived simple and humble, but was happy to live

with his family the way they lived. He was satisfied with his achievements and the life he

worked hard to live. He developed a heart problem, according to Dr. Ed Burleigh, who was the

doctor of the entire village and began to decrease his health towards his death. While some

similarities between Rip Van Winkle and Anton Rosicky are evident, they are different in the

aspects of their relationship with others, their motivation in life and the conflicts or trials they

faced.

Relationship with Others

Rip Van Winkle Rip and Anton Rosicky have many differences between the way they

manage their relationships with others. Rip Van Winkle had a wife who was nagging him all day

because he didn't like to work and was a very lazy man. For this reason, Rip did not like being
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close to his wife and spent most of his time in town playing with children in the street or helping

the wives of other men doing the jobs that their husbands did not do. He did not enjoy his wife's

company and looked for ways to run away from her presence by entering the forest with his

dog's company. The opposite was the case with Anton Rosicky who always enjoyed his wife's

company with whom he had any topic of conversation, just as they talked about children and

family, they also talked about work. Rosicky was faithful to his wife and loved her deeply. Polly,

Rosicky's daughter-in-law, had no better relationship with him, but he always treated her with

much affection, and they became having the best relationship. “"It was as if Rosicky had a

special gift for loving people, something that was like an ear for music or an eye for color”"

(Neighbor Rosicky, Page 713, Paragraph 3). Anton Rosicky had an excellent relationship with

most of the people he knew, but the same did not happen with Rip Van Winkle, who despite

getting along with the children of the town he was not the most sympathetic person in the

surroundings. Rip Van Winkle specifically did not have the most enjoyable relationships with

others, while Anton Rosicky had amazing relationships with everyone.

Motivation

The motivation between Rip Van Winkle and Anton Rosicky was different in many

important ways. Rip Van Winkle was not motivated to be close to his family or to share with

them. His wife constantly mistreated him not only in the privacy of his home but also humiliated

him in front of his friends when they met to discuss different things. “"From even this stronghold

the unlucky Rip was at length routed by his termagant wife, who would suddenly break in upon

the tranquility of the assemblage”." (Rip Van Winkle, Page 519, Paragraph 2). On the contrary

for Anton Rosicky, his main motivation to achieve all his goals was his family. Everything he

planned, he did it thinking about the personal and economic welfare of his wife and children. But
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Anton Rosicky not only got his motivation in his family, he was also motivated by his work,

which he achieved with a lot of dedication and love. He also worked very hard to be able to get

into the United States and have his farm. He worked so hard that he had a heart attack and

posteriorly died. “You’re sixty-five years old, and you’ve always worked hard, and your heart’s

tired. You’ve got to be careful from now on, and you can’t do heavy work anymore” (Neighbor

Rosicky, Page 694, Paragraph 3). Rip Van Winkle, on the other hand, was a man so lazy that he

could never get any motivation in work to move forward in life. He is considered a lazy man

when it becomes to his family, but Anton Rosicky burdens himself to ensure his family’s needs.

Conflicts/Trials Faced

Both, Rip Van Winkle and Anton Rosicky, faced many conflicts through different stages

in their lives. Rip Van Winkle misses 20 years of his life after he went to sleep for one night.

This journey was the worst conflict Rip had to face because when he comes back, he realizes that

everything had changed in the village. He felt stunned to see that the people were not the same as

he knew and even the houses and streets of the town had changed. “There were rows of houses

which he had never seen before, and those which had been his familiar haunts had disappeared”

(Rip Van Winkle, Page 522, Paragraph 3). Anton Rosicky's biggest trial or conflict was when the

doctor told him he had a bad heart. He didn't want to accept that he was sick and did not follow

the doctor's instructions about having some rest. “So? No, I guess my heart was always pretty

good. I got a little asthma, maybe. Just a awful short breath when I was pitchin’ hay last summer,

dat’s all” (Neighbor Rosicky, Page 694, Paragraph 2). He kept working so hard on his farm and

his son's farm that he ends up dying from a heart attack.

Conclusions
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There are so many differences between Rip Van Winkle and Anton Rosicky. These

contrasts in their personalities allow a different viewpoint to become apparent about each

character. While some similarities between them are noticed, there are variations in the

characteristics of their relationships with others, motivations to move on with their lives, and

trials they had to go through. Wonderful work on the paper.

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References

The Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter 9th Ed., Vol. 1 p.519,522). New York,

NY: Norton.

The Norton Anthology of American Literature (Shorter 9th Ed., Vol. 2, p.694,713). New York,

NY: Norton.