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Washington Irving: History, Tales & Sketches

The Sketch Book | A History of New York | Salmagundi | Letters of Jonathan Oldstyle, Gent. More

Edited by James Tuttleton

“The Library of America has published a volume of Washington Irving, and though I never intended to read it, I did glance through, and discovered the story of Rip Van Winkle. Rip sits down for a drink, and lo, next thing he knows, 20 years have passed. Just so with a reviewer who sits down for a glance at Washington Irving. One glance leads to several. Chapters slip past, then whole books (four of them appear in this volume), and finally the reviewer limps back to town, beard grown, hair wild, mumbling a crazily antiquated piece of news: Washington Irving is wonderful.” — Voice Literary Supplement

Overview
News & Views
Table of Contents

Overview

Story of the Week Washington Irving, “Stratford-on-Avon”
April 13, 2023

Story of the Week Washington Irving, “Rip Van Winkle”
September 1, 2019

Story of the Week Washington Irving, “The Spectre Bridegroom”
April 3, 2019

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This Library of America volume brings together the first four works of Washington Irving, America’s first internationally recognized man of letters. Irving’s early writings earned the admiration of literary figures like Hawthorne, Poe, Coleridge, Byron, Scott, and Dickens. He was widely traveled, a connoisseur of the theater both at home and abroad, and an intimate of royalty and high society in Europe and America.

Irving’s career as a writer began obscurely at age seventeen, when his brother’s newspaper published his series of comic reports on the theater, theater-goers, fashions, balls, courtships, duels, and marriages of his contemporary New York, called Letters of Jonathan Oldstyle, Gent. Written in the persona of an elderly gentleman of the old school, these letters captured his fellow townsmen at play in their most incongruous attitudes of simple sophistication. Irving’s next work, Salmagundi, written in collaboration with his brother William and James Kirke Paulding, and published at irregular intervals in 1805–06, continued this roguish style of satire and burlesque. Gossipy and current, filled with the latest news of the theater and other goings-on about town, or stirring up yet another literary squabble or scandal, Salmagundi is written with the innovativeness and energy of an accomplished new voice bursting upon a startled literary scene.

A History of New York, publicized by an elaborate hoax in the local newspapers concerning the disappearance of the elderly “Diedrich Knickerbocker,” turned out to be a wild and hilarious spoof that combined real New York history with political satire. Quickly reprinted in England, it was admired by Walter Scott and Charles Dickens (who carried his copy in his pocket). In later years, as Irving revised and re-revised his History, he softened his gibes at Thomas Jefferson, the Dutch, and the Yankees of New England; this Library of America volume presents the work in its original, exuberant, robust, and unexpurgated form, giving modern readers a chance to enjoy the version that brought him immediate international acclaim.

The Sketch Book contains Irving’s two best-loved stories, “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” It also includes many sketches of English country and city life, as well as nostalgic portraits of vanishing traditions, like the old celebrations of Christmas. One of Irving’s most captivating books, it reveals both the brilliance of his realistic depictions and his ability to appropriate European fables and themes to native purposes.

A writer of great urbanity and poise, acutely sensitive to the nostalgia of a passing age, Washington Irving was a central figure in America’s emergence on the international scene.

James W. Tuttleton (1902–1996), volume editor, was chairman of the Department of English at New York University and a co-editor of The Gotham Library. His books on American literature include The Novel of Manners in America and Thomas Wentworth Higginson.

This Library of America series edition is printed on acid-free paper and features Smyth-sewn binding, a full cloth cover, and a ribbon marker.

This volume is available for adoption in the Guardian of American Letters Fund.
News & Views

Story of the Week Washington Irving, “Stratford-on-Avon”
April 13, 2023

Story of the Week Washington Irving, “Rip Van Winkle”
September 1, 2019

Story of the Week Washington Irving, “The Spectre Bridegroom”
April 3, 2019

Story of the Week Washington Irving, “The Bold Dragoon, or the Adventure of My Grandfather”
April 3, 2018
Table of Contents

Letters of Jonathan Oldstyle, Gent.

Salmagundi or The Whim-Whams and Opinions of Launcelot Langstaff, Esq. & Others

A History of New York, From the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty

The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.
Preface to the Revised Edition
The Author’s Account of Himself
The Voyage
Roscoe
The Wife
Rip Van Winkle
English Writers on America
Rural Life in England
The Broken Heart
The Art of Book Making
A Royal Poet
The Country Church
The Widow and Her Son
A Sunday in London
The Boar’s Head Tavern, East Cheap
The Mutability of Literature
Rural Funerals
The Inn Kitchen
The Spectre Bridegroom
Westminster Abbey
Christmas
London Antiques
Little Britain
Stratford-on-Avon
Traits of Indian Character
Philip of Pokanoket
John Bull
The Pride of the Village
The Angler
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
L’Envoy

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ISBN: 978-0-94045014-1 1144 pages

LOA books are distributed worldwide by Penguin Random House

N° 16 Library of America Series

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