The sketch book of Geoffrey Crayon, gent. By: Washington Irving ( pseud. Geoffrey Crayon ) - Softcover

Geoffrey Crayon, Washington Irving

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1533539081 ISBN 13: 9781533539083

Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2016

Synopsis

The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., commonly referred to as The Sketch Book, is a collection of 34 essays and short stories written by American author Washington Irving. It was published serially throughout 1819 and 1820. The collection includes two of Irving's best-known stories, attributed to the fictional Dutch historian Diedrich Knickerbocker, "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle". It also marks Irving's first use of the pseudonym "Geoffrey Crayon", which he would continue to employ throughout his literary career. The Sketch Book, along with James Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales, was the first widely read work of American literature in Britain and Europe. It also helped advance the reputation of American writers with an international audience.[citation needed]Apart from "Rip Van Winkle" and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" — the pieces which made both Irving and The Sketch Book famous — other tales include "Roscoe", "The Broken Heart", "The Art of Book-making", "A Royal Poet", "The Spectre Bridegroom", "Westminster Abbey", "Little Britain", and "John Bull". Irving's stories were highly influenced by German folktales; "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" was inspired by a folktale recorded by Karl Musäus. Stories range from the maudlin (such as "The Wife" and "The Widow and Her Son") to the picaresque ("Little Britain") and the comical ("The Mutability of Literature"), but the common thread running through The Sketch Book — and a key part of its attraction to readers — is the personality of Irving's pseudonymous narrator, Geoffrey Crayon. Erudite, charming, and never one to make himself more interesting than his tales, Crayon holds The Sketch Book together through the sheer power of his personality — and Irving would, for the rest of his life, seamlessly enmesh Crayon's persona with his own public reputation.

About this title

From the Back Cover

I stepped upon the land of my forefathers - but felt than I was a stranger in the land. With these words, Washington Irving expresses the dilemma of every American artist in the nineteenth century. The Sketch Book (1820-1) looks simultaneously towards audiences on both sides of the Atlantic, as Irving explores the uneasy relationship of an American writer to English literary traditions. He sketches a series of encounters with the cultural shrines of the parent nation, and in two brilliant experiments with tales transplanted from Europe creates the first classic American short stories, 'Rip Van Winkle' and 'The Legend of the Sleepy Hollow'. Based on Irving's final revision of his most popular work, this new edition includes comprehensive explanatory notes of The Sketch-Book's sources for the modern reader. In her introduction, Susan Manning suggests that the author forged a new idiom, the 'Literary Picturesque', to accommodate and turn to advantage his dilemma of dual literary allegiances.

Edition details

• Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 1533539081
• ISBN 13: 9781533539083
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 94