RIP VAN WINKLE • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Rip van Winkle

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/rɪp væn wˈɪŋkəl/ Listen

Rip van Winkle

noun

A person oblivious to social changes.

A person who sleeps a lot.

The title character in a story by Washington Irving about a man who sleeps for 20 years and doesn't recognize the world when he wakens.

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Etymology of 'Rip van Winkle'

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"Rip van winkle" Quotes from Famous Books

... of Harry Norland will have been forgotten. Queer, that! We shall go on living long after we are dead and buried and forgotten. In the novels the man turns up after he is supposed to be cast away—wrecked—drowned—dead long ago. But he never turns up when he is forgotten—unless he is Rip Van Winkle. By Gad, Iris! when we are old people we will go home and see the old places together. It will be something to look forward to—something to ...

— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins

... gray or bent, and that he still seemed to have kept the resilient force of vigorous manhood, you might have thought him some incredibly ancient Rip Van Winkle come to life upon that singular stage, there ...

— Darkness and Dawn • George Allan England

... President and the politicians, who flatter themselves they are saving the country, cannot and will not understand. My opinion is, the country is doctored to death, and if President and Congress would go to sleep like Rip Van Winkle, the country would go on under natural influences, and recover far faster than under their joint and several treatment. This doctrine would be accounted by Congress, and by the President too, as ...

— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... Turkish trousers of spangled muslin, flitted before his mental gaze. When the train ran upon Dover Pier, and the white horses of the turbulent Channel foamed at his feet, he started as one roused from a Rip Van Winkle sleep. Severe illness occupied his whole attention for ...

— The Mission Of Mr. Eustace Greyne - 1905 • Robert Hichens

... "An honest Dutch lad—Rip Van Winkle, as I call him—who was wrecked with me, and our faithful dog Snarley. They set off this morning to bring in a couple of goats to be sacrificed for your entertainment. I saw you coming in last night, and I suspected that you were an English man-of-war. ...

— The Three Admirals • W.H.G. Kingston

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