Scuola Dottorale di Ateneo Graduate School Dottorato di ricerca in Lingue Culture e Societa’ Moderne Ciclo XXVIII Anno di discussione 2016 The Highlands in the Romantic Novel Culture and Identity in Early 19th-century Scottish Literature SETTORE SCIENTIFICO DISCIPLINARE DI AFFERENZA: Anglistica Tesi di Dottorato di Stella Moretti, matricola 810543 Coordinatore del Dottorato Tutore del Dottorando Prof. Alessandra Giorgi Prof. Emma Sdegno Contents Dedication ....................................................................................................................................................... iii Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................................... iv General Introduction ........................................................................................................................................ 1 PART I: THE INVENTION OF SCOTTISH NATIONAL IDENTITY ................................ 8 CHAPTER I: Literary Context and Main Themes ................................................................................................ 9 1. Introduction .............................................................................................................................................. 9 2. Sir Walter Scott and the Canon .............................................................................................................. 11 3. The Scottish Novel 1790-1814 ................................................................................................................ 18 4. The Scottish Novel 1814-1835 ................................................................................................................ 21 CHAPTER II: The Corpus and the Authors ....................................................................................................... 26 1. The Identity and Highlands Corpus ......................................................................................................... 26 2. The Authors: Nationality and Geography ............................................................................................... 30 3. The Authors: Gender and Genre ............................................................................................................. 38 CHAPTER III: Genre and Identity ..................................................................................................................... 41 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 41 2. The Scottish Gothic: The Supernatural, History and Identity ................................................................. 42 3. The National Tale: Manners, Geography and Marriage ......................................................................... 52 4. The Historical Novel ................................................................................................................................ 64 CHAPTER IV: History and Identity. The Union with England and the Loss of Independence ............................ 70 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 70 2. The Union of the Crowns ........................................................................................................................ 70 3. William III and the Glencoe Massacre .................................................................................................... 71 4. The 1707 Union of the Parliaments ........................................................................................................ 74 5. The Jacobite Risings of 1715 and 1745 ................................................................................................... 75 6. After the Forty-Five ................................................................................................................................. 80 7. The Past, Experience and Identity .......................................................................................................... 85 CHAPTER V: Cultural Invention and Identity in Scotland ................................................................................ 87 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 87 2. Literary Nationalism................................................................................................................................ 87 3. Intangible Cultural Heritage and Cultural Memory ................................................................................ 91 4. The Intangible Made Tangible: National Writers and the Novel ............................................................ 95 5. The Invention of Scotland: Highland Warriors and Virtuous Heroines ................................................... 98 CHAPTER VI: The Literary Myth .................................................................................................................... 103 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 103 2. The Re-evaluation of the Highlands ...................................................................................................... 103 3. Ossian: Sympathy and Sublime ............................................................................................................. 105 4. Late Eighteenth-century Poets: Beattie and Burns ............................................................................... 112 5. Sir Walter Scott ..................................................................................................................................... 116 i PART II: SHAPING THE NOVEL: HISTORICAL SETTING, LANDSCAPE AND GEOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................................... 121 CHAPTER VII: Identity and Historical Setting ................................................................................................ 122 1. Introduction: Identity and the Chronotope .......................................................................................... 122 2. Historical Setting ................................................................................................................................... 124 3. The Remote Past ................................................................................................................................... 127 4. Liminal Period ....................................................................................................................................... 135 5. Recent Past ........................................................................................................................................... 142 6. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 148 CHAPTER VIII: Landscape and Identity .......................................................................................................... 149 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 149 2. Landscape Theories: Reality and its Representations .......................................................................... 149 3. A Construct of the Mind: the Highlands Perceived Landscape ............................................................. 152 4. Highland and Lowland Perspectives: Ethnographical Interest and Remarks on Colonialism ............... 161 5. The Highland Beaten Track ................................................................................................................... 167 6. Stereotypical Landscape Features ........................................................................................................ 170 7. Authenticity, Alienation and Wilderness .............................................................................................. 173 CHAPTER IX: Landscape and Meaning .......................................................................................................... 177 1. The Highlands before Improvement ..................................................................................................... 177 2. Improvement and Change: The Effects of Modernity on Highland Landscape .................................... 185 3. Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................ 194 CHAPTER X: Literary Geography and National Identity ................................................................................. 196 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 196 2. Geocriticism and Literary Geography: Mapping and Literature ........................................................... 197 3. Plot and Space: Extension of the World in the Identity and Highlands Corpus and its Meaning ......... 200 4. Patterns of Movement and their Meaning ..........................................................................................