Oak Knoll

First edition limited to 255 copies on Strathmore paper, of which this is one of 225 numbered copies offered for sale signed by the editor. A fine set in a beautiful rebinding, in fine slipcase. Printed in red & black.

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 that deal with subjects such as Alhambra, Christopher Columbus and the Moors. Irving served as American ambassador to Spain in the 1840s. Born and raised in Manhattan to a merchant family, Irving made his literary debut in 1802 with a series of observational letters to the Morning Chronicle, written under the pseudonym Jonathan Oldstyle. He temporarily moved to England for the family business in 1815 where he achieved fame with the publication of The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent., serialized from 1819-20. He continued to publish regularly throughout his life, and he completed a five-volume biography of George Washington before his death at age 76. Irving was one of the first American writers to earn acclaim in Europe, and he encouraged other American authors such as Hawthorne, Longfellow, Herman Melville and Edgar Allan Poe. Henry Brevoort, Jr. (1782-1848) was a gentleman of literary taste and the life-long friend of Washington Irving, with whom he traveled in Europe and corresponded for half a century. He was widely respected for his adventurous travels and artistic interests. He accompanied Lewis and Clark on their expedition to the Pacific Northwest from 1803 to 1806 and spent a great deal of time in the North American wilderness working for John Jacob Astor's American Fur Company. He was equally at home and well received in salons throughout Europe during his travels abroad. He was a patron of literature and arts and became close friends not only with Washington Irving but also Sir Walter Scott. The World said "Himself a writer of no mean skill, Brevoort stood always ready to aid those who found writing, in a day when writing won little material reward, a gateway to financial embarrassment. To him Irving owed much of his fame and happiness." Henry Brevoort, Jr. was primarily responsible (along with Irving's brother Ebenezer) for the publication of the American edition of Irving's The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. George Sidney Hellman (1878-1958), American author and editor, amassed collections of his own and helped secure major acquisitions for the Pierpont Morgan Library. He founded and edited the literary magazine, East & West, 1900-1901; and from 1919 to 1920 served as director of the American Expeditionary Forces University's School of Fine Arts for servicemen in France. His publications include Washington Irving (1925), The True Stevenson (1925), Benjamin N. Cardozo, American Judge (1940), and hundreds of book reviews and magazine articles.