*SOLD*

Washington Irving
London, 1820
 
The first book edition of a milestone of American Literature. 
 
Two volumes - including a rare copy of Volume 1 from the earliest stock.
 
An American classic that introduced iconic stories like Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The first four American installments were collected into a single volume and self-published by Irving in London, using John Miller’s Burlington Arcade imprint, on February 16, 1820. Following Miller's bankruptcy soon thereafter, the unsold sheets, with a new title page (cancel leaf [A]2), were issued as a "second edition" by John Murray, along with this first printing of Volume 2.
 
Blind stamped diamond design on contemporary leather boards, marbled edges and matching endpapers, rebacked in period style. Bookplate of Sampson Vryling Stoddard Wilder, a wealthy merchant and gentleman farmer from Massachusetts, on front pastedown of Volume I. Both half-titles with ink signature of Mrs. Wilder, one dated 1820. The Wilder family was living in Europe during the time they acquired this set. Internally quite clean with some scattered foxing. Very Good. OCLC lists just one copy with this Miller imprint.
 
‘[Irving’s] contribution, delivered throughout a literary life that spanned the first half of the 19th century was that of providing a body of literature with which Americans could identify.
 
He was trying to find out what it meant to be an American at a time when there were no easy answers.
 
Before Washington Irving published The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., containing Rip van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, together with accounts of life in England, opinion of American literary effort could be summed up in the words of an anonymous English critic writing in 1818 who said, “The Americans have no national literature and no learned men.” Another observed, “In the four quarters of the globe, who reads an American book?”
 
As Washington Irving became known in the world, Sir Walter Scott, Charles Dickens and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow all joined his crowd of admirers. In his own country, Irving became a contemporary hero just as our culture was looking for heroes. 
 
The Sketch Book also contained descriptions of old English Christmas customs that were largely responsible for popularizing those traditions in America.’ (Tessa Melvin)