Washington Irving

Irving as Early Romanticist• descriptions of Nature’s beauty• his utilization of gothic imagery– Gothic literature--poetry, short stories, or novels

designed to thrill readers by providing mystery, villainy, murder, and the supernatural

• belief that man was inherently good and would act nobly without incentive to do so

A Writer of “Firsts”

• first belletrist in American literature– belleslettres—”literature regarded as a fine art,

esp. as having a purely aesthetic function”; Irving wrote for pleasure at a time when writing was pragmatic

• first American literary humorist• first to write history and biography as

entertainment• introduced nonfiction prose as a literary genre

A Writer of “Firsts”

• First 19th century American writer to achieve international literary reputation

• First American writer to support himself solely through writing

A Writer of Pseudonyms

• Jonathan Oldstyle• Dietrich Knickerbocker• Geoffrey Crayon

Important Works

• Salgamundi (Papers)• A History of New York• The Sketch Book• A Tour of the Prairies

Hudson River School

• Themes in the art:– Discovery– Exploration– Settlement– Pastoral America

Thomas Cole—Landscape, 1825

John Frederick Kensett—Connecticut Shoreline in Autumn

Albert Bierstadt—Sierra Nevada Mountains

Asher Durand—Kindred Spirits

Rip van Winkle Themes

• Loss/discovery of identity• challenge to American values and work ethic• Anti-republicanism--George III vs. George

Washington