Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 – November 28, 1859) wrote the story "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and Ambrose Bierce (June 24, 1842– circa 1914) wrote the story "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge". Both of these authors wrote literature classics in the form of short stories. These men were alive at the same time, though there isn't any positive proof (to my knowledge) that they met. Both men, in their literature works mentioned above, had an aspect of their story that was related to war. Irving's headless horseman was an unburied soldier from the revolutionary war, where in Bierce's Owl Creek Bridge story, the "occurrence" is based around a hanging that was conducted because of a war-time crime; the attempted sabotage of a bridge.
Irving and Bierce had very different view points on war. Bierce had a military career as part of the Union Army during the Civil War. Irving never went to war. The two authors wrote very different genre's of literature. Though both wrote short stories, Irving wrote gothic satire, where Bierce wrote fictional reality. The two men wrote at different times in history making me assume that Irving's writings were what the culture wanted during his golden time, and that Bierce's writings were what the culture wanted during the time of his writings.
What are your thoughts?
Thanks for the back ground info! I definitely agree with you, that the main reason for each of there styles of writing is the time period, culture, and what type of literature was popular at that time. What you pointed out, though, about Bierce having a military career and Irving not having any connections with war makes me wonder if that might be part of it as well. It makes sense with the unrealistic-ness of Legend Of Sleepy Hallow, and the realness of Owl Creek. Does anyone have an opinion on this?
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