Andrew Lang

Sir Walter Scott Andrew Lang

Sir Walter Scott's enduring contributions to literature fall into three categories: his narrative poems, his Scottish novels, and his novels of chivalric romance. In each of these three genres he produced works which not only delighted his contemporaries but also have shown themselves to be of lasting significance.

Scott himself was modest about the narrative poems, and there is much in them that is more narrative than poetic. Still, at their best, works such as The Lay of the Last Minstrel or The Lady of the Lake have an undeniable power in rhythm and expression that makes them excellent examples of their particular genre.

Scott's gift for narrative best served him in his prose works, especially in the Scottish novels. In these books, he drew upon his own memories and experiences in the Scottish countryside, and from the tales and stories he had heard since his youth. Many readers find in Waverley or Redgauntlet merely exciting adventures, skillfully told, but Scott put more into his novels than that.

A passionate believer in community and tradition, Scott looked back on the Scottish past with sympathy and upon the present without illusion. He seems to have been acutely aware that the heroic age had passed, and that it had been replaced by one that was more prosaic. It is the tension between these two ideals, and the elegiac sadness for the older society that yet lingered in parts of the Highlands, that give additional resonance and power to the best of Scott's works.

As the virtual creator of the historical novel, Scott was responsible for an entirely new genre. While some may point to anachronisms of detail or perspective in works such as Ivanhoe, more attention should be paid to Scott's renovation of history as a suitable topic for fiction. The historical novels have characters who lived in earlier times yet were understandable to contemporary readers. This was a new and often difficult task, and Scott succeeded in it more often than not.

Scott's place within the pantheon of English literature remains disputed. Some critics believe that he wrote too much and too hastily, and that his work suffered as a result. There is certainly some truth to this view, especially with Scott's later work, composed while he was in declining health and under intense pressure. Nevertheless, Scott's finest work can withstand this criticism, for his characters are vivid, his plots compelling, and his style vigorous. His work has weathered time and changes in critical fashions, and remains an essential part of our literary heritage.