The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow | Analysis

Legend of sleepy hollow is a kind of a short story which was written by Washington Irving. This story is based on a real legend and it reveals how the main character, Ichabod Crane, disappeared. It is such an effective story about the ghost in which Irving makes the audience to guess the truth beyond the matter after its end. The movie portrays the original story of Irving. At the beginning, the movie appears to be so similar to the story, but later changes to a direction different from the original plot.

The real story begins in a small sleepy hollow town. It illustrates the good image containing beautiful scenery, bountiful crops together with thriving land owners. Ichabod is seen to be a local pedagogue who served as a teacher of the school house in his local area. Ichabod was recognized as a strict teacher who was quite common to the students’ families, more so to the families with pretty girls. In most of the fold evenings, he usually spent most of his time with the old windows that used to sit by a fire telling ghost and demon stories together with other supernatural beings. Among these stories, there was one of the legendary Headless Horseman, which was about a soldier shot off his dead by use of a cannon ball. On the horse, the ghost of this soldier redacted all over sleepy Hollow in search for his head. The head had been replaced by a Jack-o-lantern with such a fiery glow.

This tale is associated with love story, or in other words, pure greed and lust story. Inchabod is found to be in love with Katrina Van Tassel. This is a girl belonging to the rich prosperous land owner, who was known as Hee Van Tessel. The pursuit of this girl by Ichabod is only for lustful and physical reasons. He is intended to be rich and hence acquire both the estate of Van Tassel and the beauty of Katrina, an aspect that made him pursue her. Unfortunately, he could not easily achieve this as Brom Van Brunt, a guy who was very handsome stood on his way. Brom was recognized for his pranks together with his act of trouble making as he rode his “horse Dare Devil”. Indeed, he was in love with Katrina and could not give any chance for Ichabod to marry her.

On one night, Ichabod was on his way back home after attending a dance at the Van Tessel Estate. He passed through the dark woods crossing the path to his home using his old horse. Here, a headless figure emerged from the dark shadows shocking him. Ichabod ran towards the covered bridge trying to escape. Here, the horse man was expected to get into a fire burst. Unexpectedly, ichabod was flanged by the figure with its pumpkin head.

The figure knocked him seriously felling him off his horse such that only remains of smashed pumpkin could be found left on the following day. At this state, Ichabod had disappeared. The story leaves all the readers in suspension reason of what went on. One could wonder, is it that Icabon was smashed into pieces or Brom marry Katrina after the disappearance of his opponent? And if so, was it the reason that made him to laugh every time pumpkin was mentioned?

In respect to this, Tim Burton came up with personal vision about this legend of Sleepy Hollow. Sleepy hollow is a movie concerned about a detective, Ichabod Crane, who had a specific vision about solving crimes. Ichabod is sent to Sleepy Hollow which is a small local town. He is sent to give a solution for three people from the town. Arriving on the town, he comes across a girl known as Katrina with whom he falls in love. Brom is jealous of this. Looking at the two stories, they all begin in the same manner.

The only difference is that here Ichabon appears as a detective trying to solve a mystery murder composing of three town people who had been cut their heads off and of which could not be found. The original tale of Irving is not included in this story, but highlights all what goes on. Brom is seen to pretend as the cloaked horseman.

The story also introduces both witch craft and magic. The horse man is true demon behind these killings which serves under the control of witch. In this story, the greed and lust are different from the original story. They are based true witch and not in the mind of Ichabod, as the Stepmother of Katrina maintains personal reasons regarding revenging on sleepy Hollow town. The plot proves whether the horseman was real or not. The end of the story shows that Witch is killed for the sake of giving Ichabon a chance to win Katrina at the same time proving him as the hero of the story.

In long run, Ichabod comes up with the solution. The headless head of horseman is brought back to him in whom he takes it back to hell together with the witch, thus overcoming the evil to prove the true twist of Hollywood.

Both stories are similar in that they give the story of someone whose greed and lust ends to destruction. According to the original story, the desire of Ichabod for the estate leads him to follow after the girl, hence angers the local bully. He is destroyed by his greed. He loses both the land and the girl he aimed at. He is described to be such a greedy man capable of doing anything to meet his requirements. He is portrayed as decent man performing his missions well to fight for the rights of the people.

In the story, the stepmother of Katrina is presented to be jealous. She is involved in supernatural acts in the aim of capturing all that she desires. Both stories leave us in suspense although Burton answers the questions raised. He has explained more of the ghost and supernatural demon controlled by the stepmother of Katrina. She used the headless horseman to revenge. She revenges not only to the family of Van tassel but also to all who controls the inheritance. Burton applies this line of the story to introduce the theme of greed, taking it away from Ichabod, the main character, qualifying him as the hero.

The version of Washington Irving is quite appealing in both stories. He ends up applying suspense to create the imagination. He uses dark descriptions of the horseman and bright images for the town and Katrina. This is to enhance the imaginations of the readers. Despite that the two stories contains a main character that is helpless, the plot line of the movie is totally different from the original story.

However, the theme presented in both is the same, that of a teacher. The original story leaves one in suspense wondering all what happened to Ichabod, while the movie leaves the audience wondering whether they can apply science to explain the event. There is a thought created by both in that we are left thinking of how demons and ghosts are possible.

In conclusion, both stories end up leaving the reader with questions to answer. On top of having their similarities, they contain different ideas. They are made to be different stories by the difference in their story lines.