Everything about Sir Walter Scott totally explained
Sir Walter Scott, 1st Baronet (
15 August 1771 –
21 September 1832) was a prolific
Scottish historical novelist and
poet popular throughout
Europe during his time.
In some ways Scott was the first English-language 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, and many of his works remain classics of both
English-language literature and of
Scottish literature. Famous titles include
Ivanhoe,
Rob Roy,
The Lady of The Lake ,
Waverley and
The Heart of Midlothian.
Early days
Born in College Wynd in the
Old Town of
Edinburgh in 1771, the son of a
solicitor, the young Walter Scott survived a childhood bout of
polio in 1773 that would leave him lame. To cure his lameness he was sent in that year to live in the rural
Borders region at his grandparents' farm at Sandyknowe, adjacent to the ruin of
Smailholm Tower, the earlier family home. Here he was taught to read by his aunt Jenny, and learned from her the speech patterns and many of the tales and legends which characterized much of his work. In January 1775 he returned to Edinburgh, and that summer went with his aunt Jenny to take
spa treatment at
Bath in
England. In the winter of 1776 he went back to Sandyknowe, with another attempt at a water cure being made at
Prestonpans during the following summer,
In 1778 Scott returned to Edinburgh for private education to prepare him for school, and in October 1779 he began at the
Royal High School of Edinburgh. He was now well able to walk and explore the city as well as the surrounding countryside. His reading included chivalric romances, poems, history and travel books. He was given private tuition by James Mitchell in arithmetic and writing, and learned from him the history of the
Kirk with emphasis on the
Covenanters. After finishing school he was sent to stay for six months with his aunt Jenny in
Kelso, attending the local Grammar School where he met
James Ballantyne who later became his business partner and printed his books.
Scott began studying classics at the
University of Edinburgh in November 1783, at the age of only twelve, so he was a year or so younger than most of his fellow students. In March 1786 he began an apprenticeship in his father's office, to become a
Writer to the Signet. While at the university Scott had become a friend of Adam Ferguson, the son of Professor
Adam Ferguson who hosted literary salons. Scott met the blind poet
Thomas Blacklock who lent him books as well as introducing him to
James Macpherson's
Ossian cycle of poems. During the winter of 1786–87 the fifteen year old Scott saw
Robert Burns at one of these salons, for what was to be their only meeting. When Burns noticed a print illustrating the poem "The Justice of the Peace" and asked who had written the poem, only Scott could tell him it was by
John Langhorne, and was thanked by Burns. When it was decided that he'd become a lawyer he returned to the university to study law, first taking classes in Moral Philosophy and Universal History in 1789–90.
Financial woes
Beginning in
1825 he went into dire financial straits again, as his company nearly collapsed. That he was the author of his novels became general knowledge at this time as well. Rather than declare
bankruptcy he placed his home,
Abbotsford House, and income into a trust belonging to his creditors, and proceeded to write his way out of debt. He kept up his prodigious output of fiction (as well as producing a biography of
Napoléon Bonaparte) until
1831. By then his health was failing, and he died at Abbotsford in
1832. Though not in the clear by then, his novels continued to sell, and he made good his debts from beyond the grave. He was buried in
Dryburgh Abbey where nearby, fittingly, a large statue can be found of
William Wallace—one of Scotland's most romantic historical figures.
When Sir Walter Scott was a boy he sometimes travelled with his father from
Selkirk to
Melrose, in the
Border Country where some of his novels are set. At a certain spot the old gentleman would stop the carriage and take his son to a stone on the site of the battle of
Melrose (1526). Not far away was a little farm called Cartleyhole, and this he eventually purchased.
In due course the farmhouse developed into a wonderful home that has been likened to a fairy palace. Through windows enriched with the insignia of heraldry the sun shone on suits of armour, trophies of the chase, fine furniture, and still finer pictures. Panelling of oak and cedar and carved ceilings relieved by coats of arms in their correct colour added to the beauty of the house. More land was purchased, until Scott owned nearly 1,000 acres (4 km²), and it's estimated that the building cost him over £25,000. A neighbouring Roman road with a ford used in olden days by the abbots of Melrose suggested the name of Abbotsford.
The last of his direct descendants to inhabit Abbotsford House was his great-great-great granddaughter Dame Jean Maxwell-Scott (8 June 1923 - 7 July 2004). She inherited it from her elder sister Patricia in 1998. Patricia and Jean turned the house into one of Scotland's premier tourist attractions, after they'd to rely on paying visitors to afford the upkeep of the house. It had electricity installed only in 1962. Dame Jean was at one time a lady-in-waiting to
Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester; patron of the
Dandie Dinmont Club, for a breed of dog named after one of Sir Walter Scott's characters; and a horse trainer, one of whose horses, Sir Wattie, ridden by Ian Stark, won two silver medals at the
1988 Summer Olympics in
Seoul,
South Korea.
Critical assessment
]]
Among the early critics of Scott was
Mark Twain, who blamed Scott's "romanticization of battle" for what he saw as the South's decision to fight the
American Civil War. Twain's ridiculing of
chivalry in
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court is considered as specifically targeting Scott's books. Twain also targeted Scott in
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn where he names a sinking boat the
Walter Scott. Three crooks drown on this wreck.
From being one of the most popular novelists of the 19th century, Scott suffered from a disastrous decline in popularity after the
First World War. The tone was set early on in
E.M. Forster's classic "Aspects of the Novel" (1927), where Scott was savaged as being a clumsy writer who wrote slapdash, badly plotted novels. Scott also suffered from the rising star of
Jane Austen. Considered merely an entertaining "woman's novelist" in the 19th century, in the 20th Austen began to be seen as perhaps the major English novelist of the first few decades of the 19th century. As Austen's star rose, Scott's sank, although, ironically, he'd been one of the few male writers of his time to recognize Austen's genius.
Scott's ponderousness and prolixity were fundamentally out of step with Modernist sensibilities. Nevertheless, Scott was responsible for two major trends that carry on to this day. First, he essentially invented the modern historical novel; an enormous number of imitators (and imitators of imitators) would appear in the 19th century. It is a measure of Scott's influence that Edinburgh's central railway station, opened in
1854 for the
North British Railway, is called
Waverley Station. Second, his Scottish novels followed on from
James Macpherson's
Ossian cycle in rehabilitating the public perception of
Highland culture after years in the shadows following southern distrust of hill bandits and the
Jacobite rebellions. As enthusiastic chairman of the
Celtic Society of Edinburgh he contributed to the reinvention of Scottish culture. It is worth noting, however, that Scott was a
Lowland Scot, and that his re-creations of the
Highlands were more than a little fanciful. His organisation of the
visit of King George IV to Scotland in 1822 was a pivotal event, leading Edinburgh tailors to invent many "clan
tartans" out of whole cloth, so to speak.
After being essentially unstudied for many decades, a small revival of interest in Scott's work began in the
1970s and
1980s. Ironically,
postmodern tastes (which favoured discontinuous narratives, and the introduction of the 'first person' into works of fiction) were more favourable to Scott's work than Modernist tastes. Despite all the flaws, Scott is now seen as an important innovator, and a key figure in the development of Scottish and world literature.
Scott was also responsible, through a series of pseudonymous letters published in the
Edinburgh Weekly News in 1826, for retaining the right of Scottish banks to issue their own banknotes, which is reflected to this day by his continued appearance on the front of all notes issued by the
Bank of Scotland.
Many of his works were illustrated by his friend,
William Allan.
In addition to Landseer, fine portraits of him were painted by fellow-Scots Sir
Henry Raeburn and
James Eckford Lauder.
Sir Walter Scott is commemorated in Makars' Court, outside The Writers' Museum, Lawnmarket, Edinburgh.
Selections for Makars' Court are made by
The Writers' Museum;
The Saltire Society;
The Scottish Poetry Library.
Works
The Abbot (1820)
The Monastery (1820)
Short stories
Chronicles of the Canongate, 1st series (1827). Collection of three short stories:
The Highland Widow, The Two Drovers and The Surgeon's Daughter.
The Keepsake Stories (1828). Collection of three short stories:
My Aunt Margaret's Mirror, The Tapestried Chamber and Death Of The Laird's Jock.
Poems
William and Helen, Two Ballads from the German (translator) (1796)
The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border (1802-1803)
The Lay of the Last Minstrel (1805)
Ballads and Lyrical Pieces (1806)
Marmion (1808)
The Lady of the Lake (1810)
The Vision of Don Roderick (1811)
The Bridal of Triermain (1813)
Rokeby (1813)
The Field of Waterloo (1815)
The Lord of the Isles (1815)
Harold the Dauntless (1817)
Young Lochinvar
Bonnie Dundee (1830)
Other
Introductory Essay to The Border Antiquities of England and Scotland (1814-1817)
The Chase (translator) (1796)
Goetz of Berlichingen (translator) (1799)
Paul's Letters to his Kinsfolk (1816)
Provincial Antiquities of Scotland (1819-1826)
Lives of the Novelists (1821-1824)
Essays on Chivalry, Romance, and Drama Supplement to the 1815–24 edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica
Halidon Hill (1822)
The Letters of Malachi Malagrowther (1826)
The Life of Napoleon Buonaparte (1827)
Religious Discourses (1828)
Tales of a Grandfather, 1st series (1828)
History of Scotland, 2 vols. (1829-1830)
Tales of a Grandfather, 2nd series (1829)
The Doom of Devorgoil (1830)
Essays on Ballad Poetry (1830)
Tales of a Grandfather, 3rd series (1830)
Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft (1831)
The Bishop of Tyre
Quote
Breathes there the man, with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
from The Lay of the Last Minstrel by Walter Scott
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