If you were to write an historical novel about the Scottish hero-outlaw Rob Roy MacGregor, you’d probably make it about Roy Roy, right? Well, you are an amateur, because that, comrades, is just not how Walter Scott rolls -- which actually shows us why his theory of history is pretty sophisticated. His sprawling Rob Roy (1817) is in fact about a failson named Francis Osbaldistone, with world-historical figures and Rob Roy himself sword-fighting, kilt-wearing, and doing other manly-man things around the periphery. We’re talking Marxism and history, eighteenth- and nineteenth-century constructions of the nation, and how lots of Scott’s (brunette, “Celtic”) heroines are kinda domme-y. This is a deep dive into Tristan’s dorkdom, so buckle up.
We read and highly recommend the Oxford edition edited by Ian Duncan. For more on Scott’s central role in nineteenth-century Scottish literature and modern conceptions of the nation, see Duncan’s marvelous Scott’s Shadow: The Novel in Romantic Edinburgh.
Our outro music this week is “Donald MacGillivray,” a song about the Jacobite risings, by the Scottish folk band Silly Wizard, used with permission. Many thanks to the band!
Find us on Twitter and Instagram @betterreadpod, and email us nice things at betterreadpodcast@gmail.com. Find Tristan on Twitter @tjschweiger, Katie @katiekrywo, and Megan @tuslersaurus.