The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., commonly referred to as The Sketch Book, is a collection of 34 essays and short stories written by the American author Washington Irving. It was published serially throughout 1819 and 1820. The collection includes two of Irving's best-known stories, attributed to the fictional Dutch historian Diedrich Knickerbocker: "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" and "Rip Van Winkle." It also marks Irving's first use of the pseudonym Geoffrey Crayon, which he would continue to employ throughout his literary career. The Sketch Book, along with James Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales, was among first widely read works of American literature in Britain and Europe. It also helped advance the reputation of American writers with an international audience.Background edit] Irving began writing the tales that would appear in The Sketch Book shortly after moving to England for the family business, in 1815. When the family business spiraled into bankruptcy throughout 1816 and 1817 - a humiliation that Irving never forgot - Irving was left with no job and few prospects. He tried at first to serve as an intermediary between American and English publishers, scouting for English books to reprint in America and vice versa, with only marginal success. In the autumn of 1818, his oldest brother William, sitting as a Congressman from New York, secured for him a political appointment as chief clerk to the Secretary of the U.S. Navy, and urged Irving to return home. 4] Irving demurred, however, choosing to remain in England and take his chances as a writer. As he told friends and family back in the United States: I now wish to be left for a little while entirely to the bent of my own inclination, and not agitated by new plans for subsistence, or by entreaties to come home . . . I am determined not to return home until I have sent some writings before me that shall, if they have merit, make me return to smiles, rather than skulk back to the pity of my friends. The Sketch Book initially existed in two versions: a seven-part serialized American version in paperback and a two-volume British version in hardback. The British edition contained three essays that were not included in the original American serialized format. Two more essays, "A Sunday in London" and "London Antiques," were added by Irving in 1848 for inclusion in the Author's Revised Edition of The Sketch Book for publisher George Putnam. At that time, Irving reordered the essays. Consequently, modern editions - based on Irving's own changes for the Author's Revised Edition - do not reflect the order in which the sketches originally appeared. Modern editions of The Sketch Book contain all 34 stories, in the order directed by Irving in his Author's Revised Edition, as follows............ Washington Irving (April 3, 1783 - November 28, 1859) was an American short story writer, essayist, biographer, historian, and diplomat of the early 19th century. He is best known for his short stories "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" (1820), both of which appear in his collection, The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. His historical works include biographies of Oliver Goldsmith, Muhammad, and George Washington, as well as several histories of 15th-century Spain dealing with subjects such as Alhambra, Christopher Columbus, and the Moors. Irving served as the U.S. ambassador to Spain from 1842 to 1846. He made his literary debut in 1802 with a series of observational letters to the Morning Chronicle, written under the pseudonym Jonathan Oldstyle. After moving to England for the family business in 1815, he achieved international fame with the publication of The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., serialized from 1819-20. He continued to publish regularly-and almost always successfully-throughout his life, and just eight months before his death (at age 76, in Tarrytown, New York), completed a five-volume biography of George Washington.....