Open AccessIRVING WASHINGTON'S STORIES: STYLISTIC INTERPRETATION EXPERIENCE
Author(s) -
Nina Semeshko
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
anglìstika ta amerikanìstika
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 2409-921X
pISSN - 2313-500X
DOI - 10.15421/381926
Subject(s) - literature , folklore , legend , interpretation (philosophy) , comics , style (visual arts) , intertextuality , fantasy , history , character (mathematics) , culture of the united states , romanticism , art , storytelling , narrative , art history , philosophy , linguistics , mathematics , geometry
Irving Washington is considered to be the founder of romanticism in the USA. His creative work was appreciated by W. Scott, Byron and some other writers. For modern readers he is first and foremost the authors of numerous stories. He main peculiarity of his creative works as literary critics state is in the combination of two cultures formed under the influence of the European culture. His story “Legend of the Three Beautiful Princesses” is one of the brightest in the collection “Legends of Algambra”. There is no fairytale fantasy in it and the strange atmosphere is created with the help of the writer’s appeal to the world of the East. In this story Irving Washington proves that love is stronger than religious and national contradictions. The second story under consideration “The Devil and Tom Walker” has a definitely American coloring. Fantastic and real are combined here. There are several fabulous personages in it. Tom Walker, the main character of the story, has some features inherent in any American of that time - inventiveness, practical ness, dexterity. Irving Washington doesn’t simply follow the European patterns and plots. He modifies the European literary traditions wing various comic means, American realia and the folklore. One of the remarkable features of his style in the stories is intertextuality applying to the background knowledge of the readers.