Call Number:

C1088

Repository:

Princeton University Library: Manuscripts Division

Extent:

• 1 box
• 0.2 linear feet

Language:

English

Preferred Citation:

Citations should be as follows: Washington Irving Collection, Box #, Folder #, Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

Date:

1831-1858 (inclusive)

Creator:

Princeton University. Library. Special Collections and Irving, Washington, 1783-1859.

Form:

Correspondence -- 19th century, Drawings--19th century., Lithographs--19th century., and Manuscripts, American--19th century.

Abstract:

Consists of selected manuscripts, correspondence, and documents of Washington Irving, often called the first American man of letters.

Washington Irving, often called the first American man of letters and father of the American short story, was an author, essayist, travel book writer, biographer, and columnist; he is best known for his short stories "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle." He was born in New York City as the youngest of eleven children. He studied law but practiced only briefly. His career as a writer started in journals and newspapers. He traveled widely in Europe, and it was after a seventeen-year period abroad with his brothers in England that he returned to the United States as the famous American author "Geoffrey Crayon," having successfully published The Sketch-Book (in New York in 1819 and in London in 1820) while he was away. In 1842 he was appointed minister to Spain, and in 1846 Irving retired to "Sunnyside," the family home in Tarrytown, N.Y., where he continued to write.

The collection consists of selected manuscripts, correspondence, and documents of Washington Irving. The manuscripts include a holograph leaf for his book The Alhambra, eight holograph leaves titled "Illustration to the Legend of Prince Ahmed," and one holograph leaf labeled "ch. 17." The correspondence includes letters to Benjamin F. Butler, Stephen C. Massett, Pliny Miles, Charles Scribner (founder of the publishing house of Charles Scribner's Sons), and Robert C. Winthrop. Also included are an incomplete document which bears Irving's signature as executor, a signed portrait engraving of Irving, and some original pencil sketches which may have been for an edition of Irving's A History of New-York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty, first published in 1809.