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Tarea
Does the novel actual promote moral lessons? (A Sample-answer is provided; Answer other
questions in a similar manner)
Explanation
In the opening chapter Scott tells us that his readers “will meet in the following pages neither a
romance , nor a tale of modern manners; that my hero will neither have iron on his shoulders, as
of yore, nor on the heels of his boots, as is the present fashion of Bond Street...” Where does
Scott place himself in a literary context? He states his intention as that of describing 'the state of
society in the northern island at the period of my history, and may serve at once to vary and to
illustrate the moral lessons, which I would willingly consider as the most important party of my
plan..” This statement is perplexing if we compare this statement to those in the novel's final
chapters. It is the more surprising because many readers have noticed that many of his novels
lack any direction, whether moral or otherwise.
Tarea
Read "A Postscript which should have been a Preface" (Penguin Classics 1994:471).
Find the passage where Scott refers to the "exchange of mutual protection between a Highland
gentleman and an officer of rank in the king's service". Explain why should Scott want to base his
novel upon this incident at the time of the Act of Union between England and Scotland.
Perspectivas
Linda Colley’s account (Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707-1837. New Haven and London: Yale
University Press, 1992) of the rise of national British consciousness in the 18th-century shows
that Britain was a primarily a Protestant empire, built on the foundations of the revolution of 1688,
and reluctant, until 1829, to pass the Catholic Emancipation Act., even then, against the wishes of
a the majority of Britons. For this reason, Catholicism is the major form of otherness in Scott’s
novels.
Tarea
Think about the novel's portrayal of religion in Waverly. What does Scott seem to say about the
church? Give concrete examples and quotations from the text.
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