Folk tale: A folktale (also spelled folk tale) is a story or legend forming part of an oral

tradition. Folktales are generally passed down from one generation to another and often
take on the characteristics of the time and place in which they are told. Tale that belongs to
the people; rougher than a fairy tale.

The period from 1784 to 1865 was a time of both expansion and division in the United
States. After winning their independence from Britain in the Revolutionary War,
Americans gradually expanded their nation to the West. While America was expanding
west, it also was divided between north and south. In the northern United States, many
Americans opposed slavery and tried to restrict its spread or even outlaw it entirely. The
southern states, on the other hand, had a primarily agricultural economy and depended
heavily on slave labour. Despite attempts at compromise, 11 southern states eventually
seceded from the Union and formed the Confederate States of America. In the American
Civil War, which lasted from 1861 to 1865, the Confederate Army of the south--seeking its
independence--fought against the North’s Union Army.

The American culture of this period showed the same hunger, confidence, and sense of
adventure that characterized the westward migration. While western pioneers were
exploring and settling the land, other Americans broke ground in the scientific, social, and
artistic realms. This was also the age of temperance societies and utopian
communities, Americans were reading more than they ever had and were witnessing
important developments in the field of art. The world saw the emergence of several
important American artists.

American literature also developed in dramatic ways during this period. Like the colonial
writers who had preceded them, the first writers largely followed British models. An early
milestone in the history of a truly American literature came in 1819, when Washington
Irving published the first instalments of The Sketch Book." A year later, fellow New Yorker
James Fenimore Cooper published his first novel. While the works of these two writers
also looked British in many ways, their work demonstrated two important developments
in American literature. First, each writer, particularly Cooper in his Leather-Stocking
Tales, capitalized on American settings and American themes. Second, both Irving and
Cooper were more than inferior proteges; rather, they were as talented as many of the
English masters and even earned the respect of English readers. For the next two
decades, American writers such as Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Edgar Allan Poe, and some
others, produced scores of essays, nonfiction narratives, poems, short stories, and novels
that formed a distinctive American literature.

Much of this literature still showed signs of British or at least European influence.
The first great American writer of this period was Washington Irving, whose Sketch Book
of Geoffrey Crayon, first published in 1819, was a sensation in England and helped build
the United States' reputation for creative literature. Irving was the most famous and most
widely respected literary figure in America. Thanks in part to developments in publishing
technology, Irving also was one of the few Americans to make substantial money from
writing.

Irving somewhat ironically contributed to America's literary independence while

producing work that was distinctively European in content and style. Irving proved that
Americans could write European literature as well as Europeans could. His masterful use
of personae, stylized prose, and use of European legend all demonstrate the strong
influence of the Old World on his work. Indeed, the sketches and tales in The Sketch
Book show Irving's affection for the antiquity of Europe and for the past in general.

Irving is a major figure in the history of the short story in America. It is said that The
Sketch book was the starting point for this literary form in the United States. Another
striking characteristic of Irving's writing is the preponderance of visual imagery. A painter
himself, Irving often drew verbal pictures in his essays and stories, and the title of his
most famous work makes a double reference to visual art: The Sketch Book of Geoffrey
Crayon.