Scottish National Image-Shaping: A Thematic Study Of Sir Walter Scott's Scottish Historical Novels

This dissertation is a thematic study of Sir Walter Scott's (1771-1832) nine Scottish historical novels from the perspectives of nationalism and new historicism. With historical, descriptive and inductive approaches, it takes some examples respectively from Scott's Scottish historical novels to examine how Scott established Scottish national identity by employing literary narration in his historical writing, and by his depicting Scottish natural and designed landscapes, Scottish modern chivalry, and Scottish Highlanders.As the founder of the historical novel, Scott did not focus on romance but on shaping a positive Scottish image, which was not savage, but humane, modest and dignified. As Scott retold the living history of the Scots'ethnic group, he tried hard to observe historical accuracy, and used his imagination to create some details to plot the historical facts. Scott defined not only a geographical space, but a changing historical, cultural, and ideological one. His Highlanders and commoners respectively had the same human virtues as Lowlanders and aristocrats. He gave scope in vernacular dialogues to Scottish cultural heritage, to the native, unique and poetic Scottish local/regional colour, especially to Gaelic tradition, social customs and shared beliefs in a common past.Besides introduction and conclusion, this dissertation is composed of three chapters.The introductory part surveys Scott's Scottish historical novels criticisms in the West and in China, and the attempts of the author in this study.Chapter One is concerned with"Scottish landscapes and Scottish national image". Scott's Scottish historical novels combined natural landscapes and designed landscapes together not only to highlight their aesthetics, but also to lead us to grasp the humane characteristics they represented. Scott connected Scottish regional and pastoral scenery with the exhibition of Scottish humanity, visionalized and specialized"Scottish nationality"as beautiful, grand and respectful Scottish natural landscapes, castles and historical ruins, which embodied the abstract definition of homeland in the consciousness of the Scots, and were a kind of"cultural construction"and a mark of Scottish national identity. In this chapter, this study originally analyzes Scottish castles and Scottish historical ruins in Scott's Scottish historical novels from the perspective of nationalism.Chapter Two deals with the relationship between"Scottish modern chivalry and Scottish national image."This study attempts to practise a cultural criticism, to take a close analysis of Scott's classical humane aristocrats'chivalry from the perspective of the chivalry, and Scottish humorous commoners'chivalry and Scottish beautiful, loyal and heroic females'chivalry by Greenblatt's cultural poetics. Scott's native historical novels were not set in medieval times but in a modern period—seventeenth and eighteenth centuries when chivalry was an ideal. Scott's modern Scottish knights were composed of not only the aristocrats but also the commoners since both of them made unremitting efforts for national independence. He was the first novelist in Scotland to bring the lower orders of society to life on the page, not as figures of fun but as part of humanity. He used the marginal people—beggars, witches, etc., whom historians had scornfully thrown behind them, to explain the cultural nature of history. The modern chivalrous image Scott set for us was stout-hearted figure with loyalty, generosity, piety, and courtesy, who was ready to defend Scottish national independence. The originality of this study in this chapter lies in that this research classifies Scottish humorous commoners and Scottish beautiful, loyal and heroic females as modern Scottish knights, and examines them by Greenblatt's cultural poetics.In Chapter Three—"Scottish Highlanders and Scottish national image"—this dissertation examines how Scott used literary narration to rewrite historical events; how Scott tried his best to observe historical accuracy, yet at the same time he made the historical figures in these historical events alive; how Scott painted the great image of Scottish Highlanders instead of the national"other", which Lowland Scots attempted to delineate; the poor, idle, uncivilized, barbaric one in the English imagination. This study chooses Scott's five Highland chiefs or chieftains (Fergus, Ranald, Montrose, Argyll and Rob Roy) to respectively reflect the five main characteristics of the Scots: heroism, sturdiness, loyalty, patriotism and chivalry. It attributs Scott's vivid and positive Highland image to the fact that Scott was not only realistic in depicting Scottish Highland's local colour, in his understanding of the economic, political and religious situation of Scotland, but also romantic in writing down the mythology of Scottish Highland life by fictional or actual characters or often both. It originally claims that Scott's positive Scottish Highlander image is distinct from the traditional negative one in this chapter.The last part of this dissertation aims at drawing a conclusion—Scott was a cultural nationalist. As a man who was moderate in religion and other aspects of life, Scott established a positive image for his homeland by his presentation of history, by her scenery—the beauty of Scottish natural and humanely designed landscapes; her people—the humorous chivalric Scots, especially Scottish Highlanders; the historical events—the English Bourgeoisie Revolution, the Jacobite Uprisings. Yet this study points out that Scott had two identities. Though this dissertation has paid more attention to clarify how Scott realized his Scottish identity in his native novels, the foundation of this research is on the more overt arguments of national expression in Scott's Scottish novels. This study holds that Scott was a cultural nationalist, and he was not against the improvement of Scotland and against the Union. It claims that while Scott was not against the Union this does not mean Scott was for British Empire and for English cultural colonization, because the Union did not simply mean England assimilated Scotland, but meant that Scotland and England were united together to benefit each other. This is the fourth original point of this study and the field in which the author of this dissertation would like to go on her research in the future.