After the American Revolution many Americans no longer knew who they were now. Two well-defined groups had been created, those in favor of the revolution and those against. At the same time, there were some who had just made the rounds. When the revolution ended, there were people who were stuck in the middle, confused about who they were and what it specifically meant to be American. Washington Irving shows this fear in his short story entitled “Rip Van Winkle”. In this short story he brings to life the common fear and confusion that existed among the people. Few were sure who they were and who was considered their friend or enemy. I want to show how George Irving used the fictional character of Rip Van Winkle to show the different characteristics of the American people before and after the American Revolution. Washington Irving first places Rip Van Winkle in a similar situation that the Americans had just found themselves facing. Americans were subjected to brutal and terrible control by the United Kingdom. They wanted to escape control and so they separated. Like the American, Rip Van Winkle was under the suppressive control of Dame Van Winkle. Irving describes her by saying: “A shrewish wife may, therefore, in some respects, be considered a tolerable blessing; and if so, Rip Van Winkle was thrice blessed” (Baym 955). All he tried to do was pull away from her. That's when he decided to leave his town to go hunting so he could take a break from gagging women. Rip shows the commonalities of both sides by moving away from something that was so familiar and comfortable to them. In Sarah Wyman's article they discuss this event that Rip goes through... halfway down the paper... you get a great insight into how we started as a people and what we have turned into. We can look more at the American people through the character of Rip Van Winkle and understand more fully what the people of that time were going through. Works Cited1. Allen, Thomas B. “One Revolution, Two Wars.” Military history. 27.5 (2011): 58-63. Premier of academic research. EBSCO. Network. 26 October 2011.2. Baym, Nina. The Norton Anthology of American Literature. B. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2007. 954-965. Print.3. Beidler, Philip. “The American fairy tale”. Fairy tale review. (2008): 19-30. Print.4. Ferguson, Robert, A. “Rip Van Winkle and the Generation Gap in American Culture.” Early American literature. 40.3. (2005): 529-544. Print.5. Wyman, Sarah. “Washington Irving's Rip Van Winkle: A Dangerous Critique of a New Nation.” ANQ. 23.4 (2010): 216-222. Press.