Rip Van Winkle had an identity crisis even before he went to sleep for 20 years. As a young man, he had "insuperable aversion to all kinds of profitable labor... Rip was ready to attend to anybody’s business but his own; but as to doing family duty, and keeping his farm in order, it was impossible."
This character flaw made him a favorite of all the people in his village but a real problem for his wife. He was known as a "henpecked" husband and caused a "fiery furnace of domestic tribulation". He simply was more of a romantic character who was content to watch the flowers grow rather than to cultivate and fertilize them. Once he wakes up, his wife is dead and he is able to live with his daughter. Without a farm to take care of allows him to be the "simple, good-natured man; he was" and his identity crisis is over.
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