Vashington Irving

Washington Irving was an outstanding American Romantic writer, often called the “father of American literature.” He gained the greatest fame for the stories “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”

Washington, the youngest of Irving’s 11 children, three of whom died in infancy, was born on April 3, 1783, in New York City. His father, William, a Scot by origin, served during the war with the French as a junior naval officer off New York, where he met the beautiful Sarah Sanders, the granddaughter of an English vicar. They married in 1761 and two years later moved to New York. William Irving left the sea to go into trade, but what kind of business could there be when British ships were firing on the city—those were the days of the American Revolutionary War for independence. Washington, born in a house on William Street (near Wall Street), received his name in honor of one of the founders of the United States, George Washington. When the first president came to New York, the Irvings’ maid caught him in a store and introduced the boy to him. “Please, your honor,” said Lizzie, “here is a child named after you!” Washington placed his hand on the boy’s head and gave him his blessing. Perhaps the father of the nation had no idea that he was blessing the father of American literature and his meticulous biographer!

The half-burned New York of the struggle for independence, at the time of Irving’s birth, was a small city with a population of about twenty-three thousand inhabitants, of English and Dutch origin.

From an early age the boy was marked by dreamyness, impressionability, impracticality, and complete indifference to his father’s commercial pursuits. His best friends always remained books: at school he read Cicero and Livy in Latin and adored the poetry of Oliver Goldsmith. Washington’s father was a God-fearing man who did not indulge his children with amusements. The strict discipline at home would have been unbearable had it not been for the impulsive nature of his mother, who loved her children tenderly. Washington developed a love for music, literature, and theater largely thanks to James K. Paulding, whose sister was the wife of William, Washington’s brother. Having completed his education by the age of 16, the