Washington Irving, American Story Teller Essay

Washington Irving was one of his country's first professional writers, and one of the first American writers to gain an international reputation. A major part of Washington Irving's legacy was his ability to draw on European folk tales he heard throughout his trips to Europe to create a fabricated history of his home state in some of his most famous literary pieces such as “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.” Author’s Background and Historical Context Washington Irving, named in honor of George Washington, was born on April 3, 1783 in Manhattan, New York. Irving grew up in a Scottish and English household next to a large Dutch population that had inhabited the area of New York City where he grew up. Young Irving would listen to the Dutch neighbors tell of their overseas adventures which

Washington Irving the author of The Devil and Tom Walker uses the setting of the story to convey that things with a good appearance can be deceiving and be putrid on the inside. He also creates the right atmosphere for the story, and gives precise details to the audience so they can predict the topic and how it will develop. In addition, he describes each character in a manner that the readers can infer who they are, their personal characteristics, and the decisions that they might make throughout the development of the story. Moreover, he provides a background for each character in order to understand their actions and their ending.

Washington Irving was the first American author to find success both in Europe and in America and was considered the father of American literature because of his writing which helped shape American literature. Known for his works which were inspired by German folklore which was introduced to him by Sir Walter Scott, some of Irving's works included a facet of the supernatural. A couple of his most well-known publications which depicts this are "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "The Devil and Tom Walker".

Washington Irving was raised the son of a well-off merchant. While growing up, he had the opportunity to observe people and their customs. Together he used this knowledge along with his clever use of irony in his literature to describe many varying themes and plots. His ability to convey these themes is seen in “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” where we are taught the consequences of living with greed, gluttony, wrath, sloth, envy, pride, and even lust, the seven deadly sins. Irving begins his story with a description of the town of Sleepy Hollow.

Does the name “Washington Irving” strike a bell? The author of the immortalized tales, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Winkle.” A man who has passed away almost two centuries ago, and still yet, a man who has paved the way for American literature. Washington Irving was born in New York, New York on April 3, 1783, and turned to writing once the family’s import-export business had failed. Realizing that there would be no more means to support himself financially, Irving took up his talent and his passion as his profession. Throughout his life, Irving traveled constantly; from London, England, to Madrid, Spain, as well as the Western prairie frontiers of his homeland. His most renowned work, The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon,

Washington Irving created many representations throughout his short story of Rip Van Winkle about the history of the Revolutionary War period. Washington Irving used

During Mark Twain’s lifetime, he observed the horrifying realities of slavery in the United States and the effects it held on the country after the Civil War. This experience overshadows the entirely of his novel, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, with Huck’s adventures with Jim, an escaped slave. Often, Huck finds himself unsure of the morality in either turning Jim in so he can return home as a slave, or if he should continue assisting Jim in escaping, just as Huck was forced to do. The novel introduces a myriad of characters that portray characteristics of antebellum South, such as the legal system during this time; Pap; the self-professed Duke and Dauphin; and Tom Sawyer. Each of these characters function according to their own flawed perceptions of the external world that have become enormously biased by their imaginations. On the other hand, Huck Finn himself is firmly enmeshed in reality and this frequently contradicts the beliefs of those around him. In Mark Twain’s novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the author depicts the dichotomy between reality, as viewed by Huck, and the imagined reality inhabited by the other characters to illuminate the failings of the antebellum South to recognize the immorality of slavery and violence.

Brendan Driscoll is a member of The Booklist, a group of writers who write about famous authors and the influences that flew from their novels. One of his articles deals with Washington Irving and the influences his short stories have made in American history of literature. The article, despite appearing very brief in sentences, describes a good history of why Irving is important in American literature. The article gained its details of Irving’s past from an older article written by Andrew Burstein, a critic who is the author of the article, “The Original Knickerbocker: The Life of Washington Irving”. Burstein’s article describes why Irving is the first American author to make a living at writing, and how later authors, Edgar Allan Poe as an

Washington Irving, often referred to as "the Father of American Literature." He has been seen as the first American writer to truly make a living through his creative work. Not only that he is the first American that has been acclaimed by the English literary establishment as being worthy of not only their recognition but everyone else's as well. In some ways Irving was and still is seen as a declarer of independence when it comes to literature. He has played a key role in the development of the short story as it worked towards becoming a genre, and who knows, perhaps without him having helped it could have taken another 100 years. Originally Irving did not use his real name, rather he went under the pen name of Geoffrey Crayon, it was under

Washington Irving was a very well known American short story writer in the early 19th century. He had written many short stories during his life, but Irving had been best known for the short stories “Rip Van Winkle”, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “The Devil and Tom Walker.” To this very day, Washington Irving is often considered the Father of American Literature. The reason for this is because he had been the first American writer to make a living through his works and because he had been the first American to be eulogized for being worthy enough to be recognized because of how he had started to shape the identity of America in his

American author Washington Irving, born in 1783 in New York City, was the youngest of eleven children and born to a Scottish-English immigrant couple. He best known for the short stories “Rip Van Winkle” (1819) and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” (1820). He underwent private education as a child, and was a rather uninterested student, as he often played truant from his lessons in order to attend the theater. His family was included in the small merchant class occupying the city. Irving toured Europe from 1804 to 1806, financed by his older brothers whom were troubled over his well-being. There, Irving honed his social and conversational skills to such a degree that made him a highly sought out guest. He returned to New York in order to pursue

As he got older, he became widely recognized as an eloquent writer, biographer, historian, and diplomat, and would go on to Publish many more pieces of literature. Washington Irving’s personal experiences are showed blatantly in his works. His books always emphasize the aspect of community and a sense of seriousness, which were a big part of Irving’s life. In both “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” there is some sort of a community and in both books they have a serious tone to them. As far as events/people that could’ve affected his work, I think that the events that were going on back then like yellow fever, the death of his fiancee (Matilda), and going bankrupt all made Washington Irving’s books have a serious, dreary to them. Few (if any) of his books were peachy keen. They all depicted a man’s struggles to live or controversy between different people. However, he made this kind of writing style famous and he’s best remembered as the father of American literature because he was able to stray away from the social norms of their day and create a kind of unique literature that still resonates

By Crevecoeur's definition, the creation of Irving's work was very American.  He wrote roughly forty-five short stories, and "No less than a third are traceable [. . .]  to German sources" (Pochmann, 1186-7).  Among this third are "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow," which both draw heavily from German sources-especially Musaeus' Volksmarchen (Hoffman, 347-8).  What Irving did, though, was to take the myths of Europe and create uniquely American stories.  But while the creation of the stories seems to fit Crevecoeur's mold of what American is, the message in Irving's sketches far from endorses this notion of America as the perfect society assimilating all of the good of Europe.  For this to occur, America would have to assimilate European ideas and ideas.  Irving seems to take exception to this.

Washington Irving, known as the father of American Literature, is known for his stories like “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow,” “Rip Van Winkle,” “The Devil and Tom Walker” and many more. In such famous works, Irving also shows many special literary devices, like using legends and myths within the story. Other distinct styles are using the appearances of the people of the story or even the setting.

As one of the great American authors, Mark Twain is recognized for his unique contributions as a writer, one of them being his involvements in the racial debates during the 19th and 20th centuries. Some of his works such as an excerpt from his Autobiography, stories from “The Celebrated Jumping Frog from Calavaras County”, “Buck Fanshawe’s funeral” and “A True Story” have been particularly included in the selections of “The Heath Anthology of American Literature” to illustrate the nature of The American Society and its issue with race during the 19th and 20th centuries (Lauter 408). In “A True Story”, Mark Twain writes about the accounts of an elderly African American woman as told to him by an ex-slave that had previously worked at his sister-in-law’s plantation. “A True Story” is more than a fascinating tale of an old black woman with a nature for being jovial; it shows Twain’s unique way of addressing racial legacies of the Civil War and Reconstruction through literature.