Liberal Dictionary English Dictionary
noun
- (in a story by Washington Irving) a ne’er-do-well who sleeps 20 years and upon waking is startled to find how much the world has changed.
- (italics) the story itself, published in The Sketch Book (1819).
noun informal
- a person who is oblivious to changes, esp in social attitudes or thought
- a person who sleeps a lot
“person out of touch with current conditions,” 1829, from name of character in Washington Irving’s “Sketch Book” (1819-20).
(1819) A story by Washington Irving. The title character goes to sleep after a game of bowling and much drinking in the mountains with a band of dwarves. He awakens twenty years later, an old man. Back home, Rip finds that all has changed: his wife is dead, his daughter is married, and the American Revolutionary War has taken place.