Washington Irving

1
Washington Irving

• 1783-1859

2
Biography

• Youngest son of hardware importer
• Not well educated
• Half-heartedly practiced law
• More of a socialite (partier)
• Sent to England to oversee failing branch of
  family business
• Quits family business to write

3
His Writing

• First international literary celebrity
• Genius for inventing fictional narrators
• Up until this point, we had no real FICTION from
  America
• Borrowed openly from European writing
• New voice- the settings/sounds of America
• Rip Van Winkle is actually a German tale, but
  Irving used American settings the Catskill
  Mountains and Revolution to make it his.

4

• 1st to make a living off of only writing
• Allowed him to continue parties, people, and
  praise
• Recognized short stories ability to be own genre
  (category of writing)

5
Contributions to Short Story

• Popularity
• Added local settings
• Added humor
• Added rich atmosphere and tone
• Created independent genre
• Stripped it of educational/religious nature
• Fluid and beautiful writing style
• Individual characters (not stereotypes)

6
Romantic Period

• Story-telling relives pressure about progress of
  US
• Link between fact and fiction and past and
  present
• Celebrated pastoral ideal and rural landscapes
  (nature)

7
Rip Van Winkle

• A story about past times
• Begins just before Revolutionary War (1775)