Details

Title

Narrative of the Life of Sir Walter Scott

Subtitle

Begun by Himself and Continued by J.G. Lockhart

Author

Scott, Walter
Lockhart, J.G.

Place of Publication

London

Publisher

Dent

Date of Publication

1906 Show more1906-01-01T00:00:00.000Z
1906-01-01T00:00:00.000Z Show less

Collection

Scans provided by and used with permission of Archival & Special Collections, University of Guelph Library. From the L.M. Montgomery Collection.

Note

Sir Walter Scott was one of Montgomery's favourite writers. Archival & Special Collections at the University of Guelph has 18 of Scott's works from Montgomery's personal library in their collection. She discussed and made allusions to his works in her journals, letters, and her fiction. In "Anne of Green Gables" alone, Montgomery alluded to six different Scott texts (see more on these allusions here). This copy of "The Narrative of the Life of Sir Walter Scott" was inscribed "L.M. Montgomery Macdonald March 1912" with her signature cat drawing. Montgomery has pasted an image of the Scott Monument in Edinburgh before the title page, and left a few annotations and comments throughout. On page 12, where Scott recounts a childhood illness, Montgomery has commented "infantile paralysis," and on page 349 she has noted next to the footnoted quotation, "Hector Macneill, my great-great grandfather's cousin. L.M.M." On page 651 she notes that the "immortal words" quoted are "not his" as they actually belong to Thomas Osbert Mordaunt. On other pages, she left brackets or lines around compelling quotations including, "Life could not be endured were it seen in reality," "real laughter is a thing as rare as real tears," and "It is only with imaginative minds, in truth, that sorrows of the spirit are enduring." Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) was an incredibly influential Scottish writer, perhaps best known for "Rob Roy" (1817) and "Ivanhoe" (1819). Victor Hugo, the Brontës, George Eliot, Jane Austen, and nearly every other novelist of the 19th century directly alluded to Scott in their fiction and/or counted him as an influence. This volume was completed by J.G. Lockhart, Scott's son-in-law, who was best known for his 7-volume "The Life of Sir Walter Scott," from which material was likely borrowed in this text. Read more about Montgomery's honeymoon tour in Scotland, and some of the Scott-related stops she made.

Genre

biography