Reflection: The Devil and Tom Walker

The short story, "The Devil and Tom Walker", was written in 1824 by a man named Washington Irving. The story is set in New England, specifically in Boston, Massachusetts. The story is basically about a man named Tom Walker who lived in Boston in the 1700's. Throughout the story he is confronted by a man that goes by the name of Old Scratch, who in reality is the Devil himself. The Devil begins to tempt Walker with things that he knows to be wrong. The writer reveals that it is not of Walkers personality to fall for such foolishness of the Devil's tricks. "Tom was a hard-minded fellow, not easily daunted, and he had lived so long with a termagant wife, that he did not even fear the devil." (Irving 240) This shows how the author gives a background on why the story of him being taken by a Devil's trick is so out of the ordinary. The story is very much from the Romanticism period for a huge reason from the very beginning, nature. "A few miles from Boston, in Massachusetts, there is a deep inlet winding several miles into the interior of the country from Charles Bay, and terminating in a thickly wooded swamp, or morass. On one side of this inlet is a beautiful dark grove; on the opposite side the land rises abruptly from the water's edge, into a high ridge on which grow a few scattered oaks of great age and immense size. Under one of these gigantic trees, according to old stories, there was a great amount of treasure buried by Kidd the pirate." (Irving 240) This is just the beginning of the story and the idea of displaying nature and truly explaining its beauty is a sign of Romanticism writing. Staying away from an scientific or logical reasoning of why nature is the way it is, is another huge give away from Romanticism writing. This is very similar to the story "Rip Van Winkle", also written by Washington Irving, because of its Romanticism qualities. "At the foot of these fairy mountains the voyager may have described the light smoke curling up from a village whose shingle roofs gleam among the trees, just where the blue tints of the upland melt away into the fresh green of the nearer landscape." (Irving) Here Romanticism is displayed in the warm details the author gives and also with the raw explanation of nature. There is no science or logic involve in the descriptions, like there would be in the Rationalism period. Having both of the stories being written by the same author will obviously make the writing itself very similar but not the same. The huge variance in the story lines themselves does give each story a slightly different style simply because Washington knew that stories can't all be told the same way. That’s what makes Washington a good Romanticism author because he knew how to really tell a story, not tell information. The Romanticism period was known for its wonderful stories and details it gave, not logic at all.

Irving, Washington. Matthews, Brander, ed. The Short-Story: Specimens Illustrating Its Development. New York: American Book Company, 1907; Bartleby.com, 2000. www.bartleby.com/195/. [December 5, 2011]

Irving, Washington. "The Devil and Tom Walker' Short Story" Comp. Jeffrey D. Wilhelm, Ph.D. and Douglas Fisher, Ph.D. Glencoe Literature. American Literature ed. Columbus: McGraw-Hill Companies, 2009. 240. Print.