Fiction against History: Scott as Storyteller

James Kerr

doi:10.1017/CBO9780511627590

Walter Scott was acutely conscious of the fictionality of his historical novels. In this 1989 book, James Kerr reads the Waverley novels as a grand fictional project constructed around the relationship between the language of fiction and historical reality. We can see throughout Scott's novels a tension between the romancer, recasting the events of the past in accordance with recognizably literary logics, and the historian, presenting an accurate account of the past. This contradiction, reflected in Scott's generic mixture of romance and realism, remains unresolved, even in the most self-conscious of his works. It is in this interplay of fiction and history that Professor Kerr identifies the rich complexity of the Waverley novels.

‘A complex and original interpretation of the novels … Kerr conducts some intense and scrupulous reading of Scott’s texts, honoring their imaginative richness while exposing their unexpressed ideological commitments. He brings to bear on Scott a sound critical intelligence.’

George Levine - Rutgers University

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Fiction against History

Scott as Storyteller

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Contents

Frontmatter
pp i-vi

Contents
pp vii-vii

Acknowledgements
pp viii-viii

A note on citations of the Waverley novels
pp ix-x

1 - The historical novel and the production of the past
pp 1-17

2 - The reemplotment of rebellion: Waverley and Old Mortality
pp 18-61

3 - Historical fable and political fantasy: The Heart of Midlothian and The Bride of Lammermoor
pp 62-101

4 - Redgauntlet: the historical romance as metafiction
pp 102-123

Notes
pp 124-140

Index
pp 141-142

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Scott as Storyteller

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