Washington Irving Society

Wednesday, October 22, 2025

BY TRACY HOFFMAN

Over the weekend, I attended the ALA Symposium in Santa Fe, and gave a paper, “A Tour of Pedagogy with Washington Irving,” on a Genre Pedagogy panel with colleagues from Baylor. We were pleased with how the panel went, and are considering next steps for the material.

After taking the road trip from Waco to Santa Fe, and back, stopping at the grave of Billy the Kid, I’m ready to get moving on Irving’s western narratives. Next week, my Washington Irving class begins reading A Tour on the Prairies (1835). We’re taking it slowly, doing a much closer reading of Irving, as this will be the one text we read from cover to cover.

And I literally mean cover to cover. Today, I managed to give all my students a hard copy of the book, in a variety of shapes and sizes. I’m especially thankful all my Amazon orders arrived on time, and in good shape. Students seemed pleased with the latest edition to their library collections, but we’ll see how the reading goes in the weeks ahead. We’ll be working through the readings as they finish up Literature Reviews/Annotated Bibliographies and Alternative Reality Game (ARG) projects, due before Thanksgiving.

In case you’re interested, here’s our breakdown for the reading of A Tour on the Prairies:

As we move through the material, I’ll be sure to share on Washington Irving Wednesdays what we noticed, uncovered, and discussed. If you have any tips on the text, please feel free to comment. I’ve taught the book many times, but it’s been awhile. I’m looking forward to fresh lesson plans and updated conversations about Irving’s trip to Oklahoma Territory.