As part of my goal to read more classic literature, I recently picked up the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, by Washington Irving. Set in the late 1700s, the story is about a man named Ichabod Crane, a school teacher in the state of New York. Ichabod is a single man who vies for the affection of the lovely Katrina Van Tassel while maintaining a morbid interest in ghosts, witches, and the like. The whole story builds up to Ichabod’s horrific encounter with the infamous Headless Horseman, which ends with a mysterious conclusion.

Personally, I didn’t really connect with the main character. His fixation on specters and spells was a bit unsettling, and his lovesick infatuation with Miss Tassel was too much to bear. The story was largely predictable, but I did like imagining New York before as it was before it became a booming metropolis. Even though this short story is a mainstay in American literature, it wasn’t that enjoyable in my experience.