Washington Irving
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The American edition was much cleaner, likely due to careful administration by Ebenezer and Brevoort. Ebenezer had initially approached Carey & Lea of Philadelphia, who had published an edition of Irving's Traveller, but the publisher had balked in a “cold & discouraging” manner, Brevoort reported. The New York firm of G. & C. Carvill, however, jumped at the opportunity, and published the book in a more fitting three volumes, at the price of $6.75 for the set, about $140 today.46
For the first time in his career, the name appearing on the title page was not a pseudonym but Irving's own. He was proud of Columbus. “If the work succeeds it will be of immense Service to me,” he told Brevoort; “if it fails it will be, most probably, what many have anticipated, who suppose, from my having dealt so much in fiction, [that] it must be impossible for me to tell the truth with plausibility.”47
If readers were skeptical of Geoffrey Crayon's ability “to tell the truth with plausibility,” they had plenty of confidence in Washington Irving. Columbus was well received by readers, critics, and a new audience, serious historians—a literary hat trick. “This volume will add to the already well-deserved reputation of Mr. Irving,” said the Southern Review: “Mr. Irving stands, as yet, unique in American literature. He is our only writer, whose successive publications had added to his fame…. We rejoice to see him, a writer of acknowledged fancy and wit, setting an example of laborious investigation, and careful study, than which nothing is more wanting in our literature.”48
It was Irving's style—a blend of the sober, factually based “philosophical history” so popular in his time and Geoffrey Crayon's more colorful prose—that earned the most praise. Irving had created something new with Columbus—a widely accessible, highly readable biography that was also factually correct, historically accurate, and fully documented. While many critics were uncertain how to judge such a serious work from Irving—wasn't this the same writer who had written a mock history of New York?—Irving brought it all together with his usual elegance, which convinced his critics he knew what he was doing. As his friend Alexander Everett explained in the North American Review, “Such have been the good taste and felicity of our author in the selection of his subject; such his diligence, research, and care in giving the highest finish and perfection to the style; that he has been able to bring out a work, which will rank with the very best histories of any age or nation.”49
The best and most reassuring review, however, came not from any literary critic but from Henry Brevoort, who assured Irving of his “complete success” and confirmed that his countrymen were
struck with the dignity of your style—the depth of your researches—your clear & unbroken narrative of events & above all with the romantic interest which you infused into every portion of the work—All seemed gratified that the discoverer of the new world should have found a biographer, worthy of his fame, in one of its sons…. I do hope that this universal concurrence of opinion as to the value of your labours amongst us, will at once banish from your mind every feeling of distrust as to the kindness & cordiality of your countrymen.50
For the first time in his career, Irving felt like a serious writer, who could earn his living by his pen. Beginning with Oldstyle, writing had really been the only job he ever had. Yet Irving had continued to believe writing was a pastime, not an occupation. He had viewed the success of History of New York and Sketch Book as evidence that he could write books that would please readers, even as the lukewarm response to Bracebridge and Traveller had convinced him that he should have a “real” job. Through it all, he considered himself a dabbler who wrote light, pleasing, easy-on-the-eye fiction—certainly not the kind who wrote dense, well-researched, and well-documented nonfiction.
With Columbus, he proved not only that he could be taken seriously as a writer, but that he could take writing seriously. For the seventeen months between March 1826 and August 1827, writing had been his full-time occupation. The final draft of Columbus stretched through 127 chapters in eighteen “books,” running about 340,000 words—and that wasn't counting the numerous rewrites and notes Irving had scrawled since beginning the project. The late nights, the depression, the “out of order” days belonged not to Geoffrey Crayon but to Washington Irving—but so did the accolades, the praise, and the success.
With Columbus in print, Irving was ready to quit Madrid. He had been trying to leave the city for some time, but various circumstances—especially Peter's increasingly precarious health—had kept him rooted. By the end of February, however, Peter had decided to head to France to recover his strength, leaving Washington free to look for new quarters. On a sunny March 1 he sadly said good-bye to his ill brother—“It seemed on taking leave of him at Madrid, as if I had parted with half of myself,” he said51—and climbed into a diligence bound for southern Spain.
On the evening of March 9 he caught his first glimpse of Granada beneath the Sierra Nevadas, with their snowy peaks burning red in the setting sun. The sight took his breath away. “It is a most picturesque and beautiful city, situated in one of the loveliest landscapes that I have ever seen.” In the fifteenth century, at the height of its power as the capital of the Moorish kingdom, Granada's population had been more than half a million. Four centuries later, as Irving entered the city, it was a shadow of its former glory and had only a little over 20,000 inhabitants. Yet even in its depleted state, it met Irving's expectations. “Granada, bellissima Granada!” he enthused.52
Sitting on a hill above the city was its famous Alhambra, an ornate complex of Moorish buildings that included a citadel, palace, administrative quarters, and residences. Irving immediately approached Don Francisco de la Serna, the governor of the Alhambra, as well as to the archbishop of Granada, to request complete access. Celebrity had its advantages; open access was granted willingly.
With the help of a seventeen-year-old guide named Mateo Ximinez, Irving excitedly explored the darkened corridors of the palace, listening to Mateo's seemingly endless stories about the Alhambra. “The Alhambra differs in many respects from the picture that had been formed by my imagination, yet it equals my expectations,” said Irving. “It is impossible to contemplate this delicious abode and not feel an admiration of the genius and poetical spirit of those who first devised this early paradise.”53
As Mateo chattered, Irving scrambled about the palace looking for the portal that King Boabdil had allegedly sealed when he left the place for the last time, and visited the small chapel where the vanquished king had finally surrendered. It was a grand, magical place, and Irving thought he might write a book about it, though he feared his pen couldn't do the palace justice. “How unworthy is my scribbling of the place,” he sighed.54
He filled his notebooks with descriptions and observations. It was writing for the joy of it, similar to his Scottish journals from nearly a decade before. His intent was simply to capture the moment in words: “6½ [P.M.]—Garden of the Generalife Sun going down—over the tower of the Vela—between the tower & the Cypress trees—bells ringing—guns firing salvo echoes off Mountains—birds singing—people on distant hills dancing Suavity of air—birds singing—beauty of vega—driver from Alhambra—Cypress trees of the Generalife—Silver crescent of the moon.”55
With some regret, Irving left Granada to continue his tour of Andalusia before finally settling in Seville in mid-April. He moved into a boardinghouse run by a woman with the unfortunate name of Mrs. Stalker, where he unpacked his Granada manuscript—then did very little writing. There were theaters to visit, dances to attend, bullfights to watch, and Seville was enchanting, especially in the spring. “As you pass by the houses you look into beautiful courts, with marble pillars and arcades; fountains and jets of water, surrounded by orange and citron trees,” he noted mistily, “and all lighted up by lamps and lanthorns… so that you see groups of people seated among the trees and hear the sound of guitars.”56
Murray pressed him for corrections and additions for a second edition of Columbus—all reasonable requests, bu
t it galled Irving that Murray wasn't communicating with him directly, choosing instead to make Obadiah Rich his intermediary. He hinted to Aspinwall that if Murray didn't treat him more respectfully, he would look for another British publisher. “Mr. Murray has behaved so strangely towards me in the course of the publication of Columbus that I am at a loss how to consider him either as friend or a man of business,” Irving griped, “and shall have to make some inquiries and obtain some explanations before I enter upon further dealings with him.”57
By early May Irving was constantly at work on Granada, as well as on the corrections to Columbus. For the latter, he needed access to the Archives of the Indies, with its enormous repository of books on North and South America, but he learned that only the express written permission of the king would open those doors to him. Undeterred, Irving asked Everett to secure such a letter for him.
The summer heat was oppressive, especially in his stuffy rooms in Mrs. Stalker's boardinghouse, so on July 1 Irving moved into a cooler summer cottage with John Nalder Hall, a consumptive young Englishman. The cottage, dubbed Casa Cera, was about half a league from Seville and an ideal place to work because of the quiet. “The mornings and evenings are cool for the prevalence of the sea breezes, and the nights are delicious,” Irving wrote.58
Encouraging news arrived from Ebenezer that he and Brevoort had negotiated an agreement with American publishers Carey & Lea—now officially Carey, Lea & Carey—that would provide Irving with a regular income of $600 annually for the next seven years in exchange for exclusive American rights to his first four books. A grateful Irving passed most of these profits on to Ebenezer, who was still recovering from the Welles & Williams crash of 1825. With the exception of his continued holdings in the Bolivian mines, Washington's finances were, perhaps for the first time, relatively secure. He assured Peter that revenues from Columbus and his upcoming book on Granada would guarantee that “neither of us have any further perplexity or trouble on this head.”59
Irving made a side trip to Palos to see where Columbus had departed for the New World, a nugget of information he incorporated into the revised edition. In mid-August Everett, ever the miracle worker, forwarded to Irving a letter from the king granting him permission to explore the Archives of the Indies for new materials on Columbus—a rare honor for any historian, especially one who wasn't Spanish. Irving was grateful to Everett, though disappointed to find little in the archives that he hadn't already seen among Navarette's papers.
On August 31 he mailed Aspinwall the first part of his Granada book, which he called A Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada, and asked the colonel to see if Murray would be willing to pay 2,000 guineas for the complete manuscript. If not, Aspinwall could sell it elsewhere. “I am so thoroughly dissatisfied with him [Murray] on account of the manner in which he has acted while publishing Columbus,” Irving groused, “—never answering my letters nor giving me any information concerning the work, nor in short acting towards me either as a friend or a man of business.”60 As he had with Brevoort, Irving attributed silence to displeasure or dis-enchantment. In reality, it was neither. Murray was simply over-worked—but Irving was more than ready to have his feelings hurt.
In early September Irving and the sickly Hall moved out of Casa Cera and into a country house in Cadiz with a fine view of the water. “Here I live quite out of the world,” Irving wrote, “my principal walk is on the terraced roof of the house, I rarely receive a visit, or pay one, but amuse myself by reading and scribbling.”61 He continued polishing Granada and dabbled at pieces on Ponce de Leon and Balboa. Hall's health continued to deteriorate—he would die two months later—and Irving did his best to lift the young man's spirits by chatting with him in the evenings, sometimes reading aloud passages of Granada.
At the beginning of October Irving received—at last!—several long-overdue letters from Murray. In flattering tones he knew would resonate with Irving, the savvy Murray informed his author that the first edition of Columbus had nearly sold out and that he would go back to press with the second edition shortly. The ingratiation had its desired effect. “I have felt hurt and offended at times by your neglect of writing to me,” Irving told Murray, “but you ultimately wrote in a manner to shew that whatever disadvantageous & discouraging constructions I may have put upon your silence have been incorrect.” Murray's letter was “a very gratifying one,” Irving thought. “The sale [of Columbus] continues excellent and steady, and he appears to be very well satisfied.” Murray was so satisfied, in fact, that he tried to lure Irving to London to edit a new monthly magazine, dangling an annual salary of £1,000, plus 100 guineas for any articles he might want to write for the Quarterly Review.62
Irving surely cocked an eyebrow at this offer. “The salary and other offers for casual writing would ensure me at least seven thousand dollars a year,” he told Ebenezer. But Irving refused. He wanted to go home. “I cannot,” he told Murray, “undertake any thing that should oblige me to reside out of my native country; to which, though I so long remain absent from it, I have a constant desire to return.” It was an odd excuse; while Irving had lived abroad for thirteen years, his residence had been, for the most part, by choice. Perhaps the thought of being obligated by a permanent job to remain in Europe was too daunting. Regardless, it was as good an excuse as any to keep out of the dreaded editor's chair.63
As for the offer to write for the Review, its snotty attitude toward all things American left him cold. “Between ourselves,” he whispered to Aspinwall, “were this offered for any other work it would be tempting in the extreme, but I cannot bring myself to write for a work that has been so hostile to my country.”64
At about the same time as these discussions, Aspinwall delivered the complete Granada manuscript to Murray. Again, the publisher took his time to consider his options. He was more interested in publishing an inexpensive abridged, duodecimo edition of Columbus, which might prove even more profitable than the pricey four-volume, octavo-sized first edition. Irving admitted such an idea had merit, provided the abridgment were done carefully—but he wasn't about to do it himself. “If it could be done by any judicious hand, retaining all the important and popular points of the work, I should have no objection to look over and touch up the abridgment and sanction it with my name.”65
In November Peter informed him that an unnamed publisher was planning to release an abridged edition of Columbus in the United States. Irving was incensed. “I cannot endure the idea that a paltry poacher should carry off the fruits of my labors,” he fumed. On November 19 he began his own abridgment, and completed it in a remarkable nineteen days. “Hard work,” he said to Peter, “but I think it will be all the better for being written off at a heat.” To “drive the pirate ashore,” speed was more important than profit. Irving allowed Murray to have the abridged manuscript for free, and asked Ebenezer to publish it in America immediately.66
Ebenezer and Brevoort did a masterful job of not only steering the project quickly through production, but also negotiating its sale. Washington had asked that Carey, Lea & Carey—who had exclusive American rights to his first four books—have the option to the abridgment. Ebenezer and Brevoort, however, believed this was unfair to the Carvills, who had published the first edition of Columbus. Making it clear to the Carvills that he was more than prepared to send both works to a rival publisher, Ebenezer asked for a hefty $6,000 for the second edition and abridgment—“a price,” Brevoort admitted, “which we did not believe they would give.” But the Carvills agreed, and a surprised Brevoort encouraged Irving to submit all future works on a nonexclusive basis, as “competition will always increase the price.”67 With his British and American contracts combined, Irving earned about $23,000 from both editions of Columbus and its abridgment—close to half a million dollars today—making it one of the most profitable books he ever wrote.
The money rolled in. In late December Aspinwall informed Irving that Murray had finally agreed to purchase A Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada f
or the 2,000 guineas—about $200,000 today—Irving had demanded. Irving did just as well with the American edition, which Carey, Lea & Carey acquired for $4,750—about $100,000 today—payable in regular installments over five years.
Money always brought out Irving's forgiving nature. “Murray has a gentlemanlike mode of publishing and of transacting his business that makes it highly satisfactory to bring out a work under his auspices,” he gushed forgivingly to Aspinwall. “He has, also, very excellent points in his character… which atone for those faults in the conduct of his affairs which occasionally give annoyance.”68
It had been a productive year for Irving, with Columbus published, Granada on its way, a second edition and abridged Columbus in the works, and enough notes on the Alhambra and other Spanish explorers for two more books. “I look forward without any very sanguine anticipations,” Irving confessed in his journal on December 31, 1828, “but without the gloom that has sometimes oppressed me. The only future event from which I promise myself any extraordinary gratification is the return to my native country, which, I trust, will now soon take place.”69
The year 1829 began with a pleasant surprise. For his work on The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus, Irving was unanimously elected as a member of Spain's Real Academia de la Historia. Membership in the academy was quite an honor—very few non-Spaniards had ever been elected—and Irving, who was usually embarrassed by such scholarly laurels, wrote a magnanimous letter of thanks, in Spanish, to Diego Clemencín, secretary of the academy. “I hope you will be good enough to make known to that illustrious body the great debt of gratitude that I feel toward it, and assure it that I shall at all times gladly dedicate my scant talent and learning to its prosperity and distinction.”70