Diedrich Knickerbocker In The Legend Of Sleepy Hollow

The legend of Sleepy Hollow recounts the story of Ichabod Crane, a stranger teaching students in the drowsy, bewitched county. He competes with a local macho Brom Bones to win over the heart of a girl, Katrina Van Tassel, who is a blooming lass and the only daughter of a substantial farmer. Eventually, Ichabod fails in the “love combat”. He is almost scared to death by the appearance of the headless trooper, which is probably pretended by Brom Bones, and he flees far, far away from the town forever.

The story is quiet unique in terms of its narrative technique. When reading the article for the first time, there is a puzzle lingering in my mind: Who is the narrator? On first look, the answer may be obvious—Diedrich Knickerbocker is the narrator, for the legend was found “among the papers of the late Diedrich Knickerbocker”. But when the readers finish reading the postscript, they will find out the tale was told by a “pleasant, shabby, gentlemanly old fellow” who “does not believe one-half of the story himself.” However, if we take a scrutiny over

In the first half of the story, it is the storyteller’s responsibility to inform readers of the background knowledge with sufficient information. So the narrator is all-knowing, playing the role of god. But as the story evolves, readers will gradually lose their interest. To seize reader’s attention, the narrator stops disclosing the protagonist’s inner mind. As we can see, the narrator uses two paragraphs to depict Ichabod Crane’s fantasy for his married life with Katrina (paragraph 21 and 22) in the beginning part of the story, but the psychological description becomes fewer and fewer, and eventually, there is almost no description about Ichabod’s thoughts in his encounter with the headless horseman. By applying the alternation of narrative point of view from knowing everything to knowing nothing, the author leaves readers a larger room for imagination and