The Legend of Sleepy Hollow

“A pleasing land of drowsy head it was, / Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye; / And of gay castles in the clouds that pass, / Forever flushing round a summer sky. / CASTLE OF INDOLENCE.”

This quotation opens the story. It is from the poem “The Castle of Indolence” by the Scottish poet James Thomson. Written in 1746, the poem is an example of the early Romantic style. The poem describes a wizard named Indolence who lures travelers to his castle, where they sink into a stupor, only to be thrown into a dungeon. Irving uses this quotation to set the comforting but dangerous effect that Sleepy Hollow has on anyone who resides there.

“I recollect that, when a stripling, my first exploit in squirrel-shooting was in a grove of tall walnut-trees that shades one side of the valley. […] If ever I should wish for a retreat whither I might steal from the world and its distractions, and dream quietly away the remnant of a troubled life, I know of none more promising than this little valley.”

One of the tropes that lends the story credibility is that the narrator himself spent time in Sleepy Hollow and can vouch for its peaceful effect. Washington Irving was born in New York City, but he lived in Tarrytown from 1798-1804, before moving to Europe. In Tarrytown, Irving became familiar with the Dutch customs and ghost stories of Sleepy Hollow, which inspired the story. 

“In this by-place of nature there abode, in a remote period of American history, that is to say, some thirty years since, a worthy wight of the name of Ichabod Crane, who sojourned, or, as he expressed it, ‘tarried,’ in Sleepy Hollow, for the purpose of instructing the children of the vicinity.”

This passage is unique because, in introducing Ichabod Crane, the narrator purports to know what Ichabod said, even though Ichabod’s story takes place 30 years before the present day. The use of a direct quotation is also notable because the story contains almost no dialogue.