Washington Irving (1783–1859) was a popular American writer and diplomat. The “first American man of letters,” he is chiefly remembered as a historian and as the writer of romantic sketches and tales. He was influential in the development of the short story form and helped gain international respect for the fledgling American literature.
Born into a prosperous family in New York City, Irving studied law, visited Rome, Paris, the Netherlands, and London, and on his return in 1806 was admitted to the Bar.
Irving’s Salmagundi (1808,) a series of satirical essays on the state of the theatre, was followed by the burlesque A History of New York (1809,) supposedly written by a Dutch New Yorker named Diedrich Knickerbocker. Despite the pseudonym, it made him well known in New York.
Irving served as an officer in the 1812 War between the U.S. and U.K. and lived in Europe 1815–32. Under the pseudonym Geoffrey Crayon, he wrote The Sketch Book (1819–20,) a collection that contains his famous tales, “The Spectre Bridegroom,” “Rip Van Winkle,” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.”
Irving produced another collection, Tales of a Traveller (1824.) His stay in Spain 1826–29 produced the studies The History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (1828) and The Conquest of Granada (1829.) Upon his return to New York in 1832, Irving published A Tour on the Prairie (1835) and The Adventures of Captain Bonneville, USA (1837.)
Irving was the U.S. ambassador to Spain 1842–46. He completed his Life of George Washington (1855–59) shortly before his death.
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There is a healthful hardiness about real dignity that never dreads contact and communion with others, however humble.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Dignity
I am always at a loss at how much to believe of my own stories.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Authors & Writing, Writing, Writers
Who ever hears of fat men heading a riot, or herding together in turbulent mobs? No—no, your lean, hungry men who are continually worrying society, and setting the whole community by the ears.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Diet
Every desire bears its death in its very gratification.—Curiosity languishes under repeated stimulants, and novelties cease to excite surprise, until at length we do not wonder even at a miracle.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Desire
It was, as I have said, a fine autumnal day; the sky was clear and serene, and nature wore that rich and golden livery which we always associate with the idea of abundance. The forests had put on their sober brown and yellow, while some trees of the tenderer kind had been nipped by the frosts into brilliant dyes of orange, purple, and scarlet.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Autumn
History fades into fable; fact becomes clouded with doubt and controversy; the inscription moulders from the tablet; the statue falls from the pedestal.—Columns, arches, pyramids, what are they but heaps of sand, and their epitaphs but characters written in the dust?
—Washington Irving
Topics: Change
In civilized life, where the happiness and indeed almost the existence of man, depends on the opinion of his fellow men. He is constantly acting a studied part.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Acting, Actors
Her mighty lakes, like oceans of liquid silver; her mountains with their right aerial tints; her valleys, teeming with wild fertility; her tremendous cataracts, thundering in their solitudes; her boundless plains, waving with spontaneous verdure; her brought deep rivers, rolling in solemn silence to the ocean; her trackless forests, where vegetation puts forth all its magnificence; her skies, kindling waves in the magic of the summer clouds and glorious sunshine;—no, never need an American look beyond his own country for the sublime and beautiful of natural scenery
—Washington Irving
Topics: Wilderness
Honest good humor is the oil and wine of a merry meeting, and there is no jovial companionship equal to that where the jokes are rather small and the laughter abundant.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Cheerfulness
Redundancy of language is never found with deep reflection. Verbiage may indicate observation, but not thinking. He who thinks much, says but little in proportion to his thoughts. He selects that language which will convey his ideas in the most explicit and direct manner. He tries to compress as much thought as possible into a few words. On the contrary, the man who talks everlastingly and promiscuously, who seems to have an exhaustless magazine of sound, crowds so many words into his thoughts that he always obscures, and very frequently conceals them.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Style, Talking
Little minds are tamed and subdued by misfortune, but great minds rise above it.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Courage, Adversity, Challenges, Misfortune
Enthusiasts soon understand each other.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Enthusiasm
The great British Library—an immense collection of volumes of all ages and languages, many of which are now forgotten, and most of which are seldom read: one of these sequestered pools of obsolete literature to which modern authors repair, and draw buckets full of classic lore, or “pure English, undefiled” wherewith to swell their own scanty rills of thought.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Libraries
The natural principle of war is to do the most harm to our enemy with the least harm to ourselves; and this of course is to be effected by stratagem.
—Washington Irving
Topics: War
A woman is more considerate in affairs of love than a man; because love is more the study and business of her life.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Love
A barking dog is often more useful than a sleeping lion.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Usefullness, One liners, Action
There is one in the world who feels for him who is sad a keener pang than he feels for himself; there is one to whom reflected joy is better than that which comes direct; there is one who rejoices in another’s honor, more than in any which is one’s own; there is one on whom another’s transcendent excellence sheds no beam but that of delight; there is one who hides another’s infirmities more faithfully than one’s own; there is one who loses all sense of self in the sentiment of kindness, tenderness, and devotion to another; that one is woman.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Woman
Nothing can be more touching than to behold a soft and tender female, who has been all weakness and dependence, and alive to every trivial roughness while treading the prosperous paths of life, suddenly rising in mental force to be the comforter and supporter of her husband under misfortune, and abiding with unshrinking firmness the bitterest blast of adversity.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Wife
The paternal hearth, that rallying place of the affections.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Home
Rising genius always shoots out its rays from among the clouds, but these will gradually roll away and disappear as it ascends to its steady luster.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Genius
A mother is the truest friend we have, when trials, heavy and sudden fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends, who rejoiced with us in our sunshine desert us; when troubles thicken around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Friendship, Mothers
A curtain lecture is worth all the sermons in the world for teaching the virtue of patience and long suffering.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Patience
There is a serene and settled majesty to woodland scenery that enters into the soul and delights and elevates it, and fills it with noble inclinations.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Soul
Great minds have purposes; others have wishes.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Purpose, One liners, Mind, Dedication, Aspirations, Wishes, Commitment, Goals
A father may turn his back on his child; brothers and sisters may become inveterate enemies; husbands may desert their wives, and wives their husbands. But a mother’s love endures through all; in. good repute, in bad repute, in the face of the world’s condemnation, a mother still loves on, and still hopes that her child may turn from his evil ways, and repent; still she remembers the infant smiles that once filled her bosom with rapture, the merry laugh, the joyful shout of his childhood, the opening promise of his youth; and she can never be brought to think him all unworthy.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Mother, Mothers
There is a certain artificial polish and address acquired by mingling in the beau monde, which, in the commerce of the world, supplies the place of natural suavity and good humor; but it is too often purchased at the expense of all original and sterling traits of character.
—Washington Irving
The love of a delicate female is always shy and silent. Even when fortunate, she scarcely breathes it to herself; but when otherwise, she buries it in the recesses of her bosom, and there lets it cower and brood among the ruins of her peace.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Love
I profess not to know how women’s hearts are wooed and won.—To me they have always been matters of riddle and admiration.
—Washington Irving
The dullest observer must be sensible of the order and serenity prevalent in those households where the occasional exercise of a beautiful form of worship in the morning gives, as it were, the keynote to every temper for the day, and attunes every spirit to harmony.
—Washington Irving
Topics: Day
By a land of fashionable discipline, the eye is taught to brighten, the lip to smile, and the whole countenance to emanate with the semblance of friendly welcome, while the bosom is unwarmed by a single spark of genuine kindness and good-will.
—Washington Irving
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