Waverley

Waverley is Walter Scott’s historical novel about a young Englishman drawn into the Jacobite rising of 1745. Edward Waverley’s fascination with unfamiliar customs and heroic ideals makes him receptive to loyalties he does not fully understand. His movement between different communities exposes the difference between imagined adventure and the consequences of historical conflict. Landscape, speech, and hospitality give the societies he encounters a particular presence. Scott’s narrative looks back upon a divided past with sympathy while showing how private affections and political commitments can become dangerously entangled.