LITR 4232: American Renaissance

University of Houston-Clear Lake, spring 2002

Student Presentation Summary

Reader:    Leigh Ann Moore

Recorder:  Terri St. John

            My presentation involved talking about both The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and The Last of the Mohicans.  I focused on Objective 2, covering how both Cooper and Irving wrote in the romantic style, using stock characters, and many examples of the gothic and the sublime.

            The description of Icabod (page 2095) and that of the Stranger (David Gamut) (page 16) are very similar.  The descriptive language used to draw these characters in our imagination seems to make them come off the page.  This same technique is used when describing the landscape and how the characters imaginations create much of the suspense.  The characters of Icabod and David Gamut are stock characters that are found in much of the literature of this time period.  It was originally used to portray a pro-American message and thumb their nose at the aristocratic privileged system of Europe.  A visual of these characters can be seen in the caricature of “Uncle Sam”, first seen during the war of 1812.  This caricature is said to be based on a character similar to that of Icabod and David Gamut named Brother Jonathan in the play The Contrast by Royall Ryler.  This stock character of a thin, moralistic, dry, Yankee became a standard in much of the literature of this time period. 

The similarities also exist when describing landscape and the imaginations of their characters.  While one speaks of ghosts and goblins (p 2108), the other references evils and savages (p 13).  Irving and Cooper both demonstrate how their characters imaginations expand any influence that stories or fear have upon them.  Both of these passages have representations of the sublime and the gothic.  When picturing the characters and the scenes around them, their mind and imagination seem to be represented in the landscape around them. 

My question to the class at this time was: what is the significance readers can build from these comparisons?

CLASS DISCUSSION

Val Harpster:    It seems like a formula.

Dr. White:        Stock characters can also be key characters. David and Ichabod were both  well-developed characters.

Angie Rau:        Irving’s Ichabod character was made more romantic even though he was so nerdy.

Ronda Dunn:    Both characters were used as a plot instrument. The stories started out dormant but their development brought forth or introduced another character or action.

Val Harpster:    These type characters are familiar to the average reader.

Dr. White:        Ichabod is the main character although he is automatically ridiculous.  In the Mohican’s, David is a supporting character.

Leigh Ann Moore:             The stock character is not necessarily the best and the brightest.  It was originally meant to say that even in this character of Icabod, our American ideas are much better than the Old World English ideas.  American authors’ characters are more developed.

Ronda Dunn:    David’s Christian beliefs conflict with necessary survival instincts required in the wilderness. Heyward and Hawkeye are contrasting characters.

Diane Tincher:            Irving’s character was intentionally funny while Cooper’s David just “is”.

Dr. White:        (Agreeing with Mark Twain) Cooper is terrible at comedy!

Diane Tincher:            David is not so vivid.

Val Harpster:    I can see him in a swashbuckler outfit.

Leigh Ann Moore:             The gothic and sublime are also seen in the landscape descriptions.  (Refocuses on specific passages)

Angie Rau:        “Last of the Mohicans” uses very descriptive words as well as the relationship of the headless horseman.

Brenda Upton:              Descriptions in the Mohicans referred to scalping and Indian dress.

Ronda Dunn:    I thought it was ironic that both stories took place at the same location.

                        The Hudson River area. (Referring to “Last of the Mohicans”)

On page one, “. .Jesuit missionaries. . .baptism. . “ brings out the religious or spiritual. The emotions are magnified.

Kate Payne:      The use of emotions is another way for the reader to identify.

Dr. White:        Ichabod was remembering his ghost stories.  Which is haunted, his mind or the forest? This relates to the term “correspondence” which means the mirroring of landscape and mind.

Ronda Dunn:    It reminds me of the “Blair Witch Project.” Dark romance.

Angie Rau:        Fear took over their ability to reason.

Brenda Upton: Was fear caused from mind or tree?

Ronda Dunn: Ichabod sets himself up with his book of ghosts.

            The gothic and the sublime are found throughout the descriptive language of both The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and The Last of the Mohicans.  The language is so descriptive that it comes to life in the reader’s imagination.  The landscape and the mind mirror each other.  The addition of the stock characters of Icabod and David Gamut, whom have the same countenance about them, add a familiar character to the story that the average reader of this period came to expect and were comfortable with.  The setting of the gothic and sublime in the American wilderness as opposed to old European castles and the stock characters extolling American virtues makes these stories unique to American literature.