Scott's most revered novel, written in 1791, is a love story set in the Middle Ages. The hero is a Saxon knight, Wilfred of Ivanhoe, whose personal chivalric code comes into conflict with the corruption of his arch-rival, the Knight Templar Brian de Bois-Guilbert. Ivanhoe is also torn between the woman to whom he is betrothed, Rowena, and a ...
The second of Tales of the Crusaders, The Talisman is set in Palestine during the Third Crusade (1189 - 92). Scott constructs a story of chivalric action, apparently adopting a medieval romance view of the similarities in the values of both sides. But disguise is the leading theme of the tale: it is not just that characters frequently wear ...
Usually considered the first 'historical" novel in English, "Waverly" is set at the time of the Jacobite rebellion of 1745. Edward Waverly, a young Englishman--and, like Scott, a romantic who idealizes the noble, rugged Highlanders, is sent to Scotland, where he is caught up in the pretender's cause. The hero's journey of self-discovery takes ...
Two feuding Scottish families, a tragic love affair, a cruel and scheming mother, murder, and insanity form the basis for Scott's most intricate and searching love story, the tale of tragically conflicting passion which conveys challenging insights into emotional and sexual politics. The novel was the basis for Donizetti's 1835 opera, "Lucia di ...
Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, first published in 1815, was Walter Scott's second novel. Guy Mannering only half-believes in his art, but does believe in the ability of his patriarchal power, wealth and social position to sort out social confusion. However he has to learn the limits of a nabob's authority in a society that (in the 1780s) is no ...
This 1818 novel is considered Scott's best work. It opens in 1736 with a prison riot, out of which a melodramatic but convincing story evolves. Effie Deans, falsely accused of murdering her son, is sentenced to death. Her sister, the memorable Jeanie Deans--one of Scott's most beloved heroines--sets out to secure a pardon from the queen. She ...
Set at the end of the 18th century, the story is told by a man who tends the graves of the old Scottish Covenanters. As he tells their stories, a picture of Scotland during the Jacobite Rebellion is created, particularly in the tale of the novel's hero, Henry Morton, a Covenanter in love with a woman from a family of royalist sympathizers, and the ...
'It was early in a fine summer's day, near the end of the eighteenth century, when a young man, of genteel appearance, having occasion to go towards the north-east of Scotland, provided himself with a ticket in one of those public carriages which travel between Edinburgh and the Queensferry...' So begins Scott's personal favourite among his novels ...
Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (1771-1832) was a prolific Scottish historical novelist and poet popular throughout Europe during his time. In some ways Scott was the first author to have a truly international career in his lifetime, with many contemporary readers all over Europe, Australia, and North America. His novels and poetry are still read, ...
First published in 1924, this classic four-volume work contains various Greek and Latin writings of religious or philosophic teachings ascribed to Hermes Trismegistus, with Walter Scott's extensive notes, commentary, and addenda. It is said that these teachings are records of private, intimate talks between a teacher and one or two of his ...
In the court of Elizabeth I, Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, is favoured above all the noblemen of England. It is rumoured that the Queen may chose him for her husband, but Leicester has secretly married the beautiful Amy Robsart. Fearing ruin if this were known, he keeps his lovely young wife a virtual prisoner in an old country house. ...
Quentin Durward is a young Scotsman seeking fame and fortune in the France of Louis XI in the fifteenth century. He knows little and understands less, but Scott represents his ignorance and naivete as useful to 'the most sagacious prince in Europe' who needs servants motivated solely by the desire for coin and credit and lacking any interest in ...
The Edinburgh edition of Walter Scott's "Waverley" novels presents an edition for modern readers incorporating an essay on the text, an emendation list, explanatory notes and a glossary. This edition hopes to bring to its audience what the first readers might have been offered had the process of transmission from manuscript to print not been so ...
The notion that witchcraft faded away with the onset of the scientific revolution is entirely mistaken. This text stands in the grand tradition of writing and witchcraft and suggests that magic was alive and well in 19th-century Scotland, as contemporary newspaper reports confirm. Carefully researched, alive with stories drawn from Sir Walter ...
Woodstock opens in farce, yet it is one of Scott's darkest novels. It deals with revolution, to Scott the most disturbing of all subjects: 'it appears that every step we made towards liberty, has but brought us in view of more terrific perils'. Written during the financial crisis which led to his insolvency in January 1826, the novel, Scott feared ...
Anne of Geierstein (1829) is set in Central Europe in the fifteenth century, but it is a remarkably modern novel, for the central issues are the political instability and violence that arise from the mix of peoples and the fluidity of European boundaries. With Anne of Geierstein Scott concludes the unfinished historical business of Quentin ...
The noble seat, called Woodstock, is one of the ancient honors belonging to the crown. Several mannors owe suite and service to the place; but the custom of the countrey giving it but the title of a mannor, we shall erre with them to be the better understood. The mannor-house hath been a large fabric, and accounted amongst his majestie's standing ...
Castle Dangerous is the realisation of a thirty-year old project of Scott's to retell a story found in Barbour's Brus. Set in the early fourteenth century during the Scottish Wars of Independence, an English knight for a love wager commits himself to defend Douglas Castle against Scottish attempts to retake it. The ballad-like story embraces ...
1905. Sir Walter Scott was a master of diverse talents. He was a man of letters, a dedicated historian and historiographer, a well-read translator of foreign texts, and a talented poet. Deriving most of his material from his native Scotland, its history and its legends, Scott invented and mastered what we know today as the historical novel. ...
In "The Antiquary" (1816), written by Sir Walter Scott, the character of the title, a collector of antiques, is not the hero, instead he provides the narration and commentaries on the story of a man known as Major Neville, who seeks knowledge of his birth and the love of Isabella Wardour. Like all of Scott's historical fiction, this novel is an ...
This 1818 novel is considered Scott's best work. It opens in 1736 with a prison riot, out of which a melodramatic but convincing story evolves. Effie Deans, falsely accused of murdering her son, is sentenced to death. Her sister, the memorable Jeanie Deans--one of Scott's most beloved heroines--sets out to secure a pardon from the queen. She ...
Recounting the last six years of his life, years tainted by ill health, bereavment and financial ruin, Scott provides a day to day account of his trials, tribulations and celebrity status. This edition comes complete with edited text and draws from contemporary material.
"The Abbot" revolves around the escape of Mary Queen of Scots from imprisonment in Loch Leven Castle and her flight to England following the battle of Langside. Her page, Roland Graeme, has been instructed to spy on her -- but his sense of honor, his loyalty to Mary (instilled by his Catholic grandmother, Madgalen Graeme), and his love for one of ...
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