Washington Irving
Washington Irving''s "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) opens with a description of the "Kaatskill" (today commonly "Catskill") mountains above the Hudson River, a landscape memorialized by Cole and other painters identified with the Hudson River School. "Every change of season, every change of weather, indeed, every hour of the day, produces some change in the magical hues and shapes of these mountains," Irving writes. On a journey into the mountains to escape the "terrors" of his wife, Rip contemplates a scene that reflects the contrast between the sublime and the beautiful that structured the Romantic landscape tradition:
From an opening between the trees, he could overlook all the lower country for many a mile of rich woodland. He saw at a distance the lordly Hudson, far, far below him, moving on its silent but majestic course, the reflection of a purple cloud, or the sail of a lagging bark, here and there sleeping on its glassy bosom, and at last losing itself in the blue highlands. (940)
Here Burke''s idea of beauty is predominant: the landscape is agreeable, sociable ("lagging bark" registers a human presence), pastel-colored ("purple cloud"), soft and feminized ("sleeping on its glassy bosom"). However, the opposite prospect sends a different message:
On the other side he looked down into a deep mountain glen, wild, lonely and shagged, the bottom filled with fragments from the impending cliffs, and scarcely lighted by the reflected rays of the setting sun. For some time Rip lay musing on this scene, evening was gradually advancing, the mountains began to throw their long blue shadows over the valleys, he saw that it would be dark long before he could reach the village, and he heaved a heavy sigh when he thought of encountering the terrors of Dame Van Winkle. (Norton 1: 941)
"[D]eep," "wild," "lonely," "shagged," and "scarcely lighted," followed quickly by the "terrors of Dame Van Winkle," are code words for the Burkean sublime, which connotes harsh, antisocial, threatening, and obscure feelings. In fact, the scene forms a sublime picture for Rip as well as the reader, insofar as it follows Burke''s rule that only representation, not reality, can be sublime. At a comfortable remove, Rip can enjoy "musing on this scene," without facing directly the domestic terrors that appear to be its underlying association.
