Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart

This celebrated seven-volume biography (1837–8) draws on personal accounts of Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832), correspondence and autobiographical sketches.

John Gibson Lockhart (Author)

9781108056991, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 13 November 2012

426 pages
21.6 x 14 x 2.4 cm, 0.54 kg

As son-in-law and literary executor to Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832), John Gibson Lockhart (1794–1854) was uniquely placed to produce a definitive biography of the great poet and novelist. First published in 1837–8, shortly after Scott's death, this celebrated seven-volume work is based on personal memories, correspondence, and Scott's own autobiographical sketches. Wide-ranging in his purview, Lockhart is also detailed in his descriptions: the Aberdeen Journal of the day observed that the volumes trace Scott's life and literary efforts with 'the most minute distinctness'. Volume 3 opens in 1812 with an account of 'one of the busiest summers of Scott's busy life', during which he finally moved into his beloved Abbotsford. Incorporating extracts from Scott's correspondence with the English poet George Crabbe, this volume covers the period in which Scott finished Waverley (1814) and published in verse The Field of Waterloo (1815).

1. The 'flitting' to Abbotsford
2. Affairs of John Ballantyne and Co.
3. Insanity of Henry Weber
4. Voyage to the Shetland Isles, etc.
5. Diary on board the lighthouse yacht continued
6. Diary continued
7. Diary continued
8. Diary continued
9. Letters in verse from Zetland and Orkney
10. Progress of The Lord of the Isles
11. Battle of Waterloo
12. Poem of The Field of Waterloo published
Appendix.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: general [DSB]