Historical novel and its features. W. Scott, poet and novelist. Rob Roy

Tambov State University

Historical novel and its features. W. Scott, poet and novelist. “Rob Roy”

Student: Diakova L.Yu.

Tutor: Chernysheva A.P.

Tambov 2011

Contents

Introduction

Historical novel

Walter Scott, biography and works

“Rob Roy”

Conclusion

References

Introduction

Historical fiction as a genre is important and relevant to our times for many reasons. It has also been one of the more popular genres of the twentieth century world literature. There have been many novels and short stories belonging to this genre written in the past 200 years which have achieved cult status. Their fame and presence in literature is a matter of curiosity. Some of the most famous novels of this genre are, The Sea of Poppies, A Spoke in the wheel, Ivanhoe, Waverly, etc. The aim of this paper is to study and analyse various aspects of the historical novel, i.e., need for fiction in a historical narrative, the defining features of historical fiction and having a good look at works of Walter Scott, who is generally considered to be the founder of this genre, and his “Rob Roy” in particular.

But before we go on to define historical fiction as a genre, it is necessary to consider those parameters which would enable a set of texts to be termed similar and understand that it is also possible that a particular text belongs to multiple genres, a historical tragedy for instance, which borrows or recombines from more than one previously existing work of literature.

Historical novel

Irrespective of the literariness, human beings have always found a need to relook at their history every now and then. Not only has history been revisited again and again, but also, it has been reinterpreted and sometimes even been rewritten. One of the major driving forces behind this urge to know the past has been, to know what formed our identity at large, along with a curiosity to understand what it felt like to be in those defining moments or periods of history. In both cases, deeper understanding of history led to a more personal relationship with it, for one could only leave a large part of it to the imagination of the individual. And at the same time, it also varied as to how a person perceived life in a particular period of the past to be, based on the information given to him and based on how he interpreted it. Hence, while the accuracy of a given history is always debatable, history always has given ample scope for poets, novelists, and writers to simulate the emotions of people of the past, to cater to the curiosity and the need of the people of the present. At the same time in some cases the distinction between an author and a historian is blurring, with authors themselves providing other arguments or evidences supporting or opposing something and critically analysing various events in history from points of view generally alien to academic literature in history.

Thus, literary works pertaining to history have come to making a historiography of their own, much similar to political historiography, or social historiography, and merging a lot of other historiographies. Perhaps, what it ‘felt’ like to be in a period, consisted of all these components, and only if one considered various historiographies of a period was one able to understand a period from a more personal standpoint.

Coming to the ways in which history is dealt with by litterateurs, there have been many, such as in the form of epics, ballads, poems, folklores and most recently in the form of a novel.

It is important to understand the various factors which brought the novel itself into prominence before delving into the sub-genre of historic novel. The novel by definition itself is very narrowly different from history (as a genre). Fictionality and the presentation in a narrative are the two features most commonly invoked to distinguish novels from histories. Most importantly novels are supposed to show literature and art, instead of mere facts. Although the evolution of this genre is by distinguishing itself from history, over a period of time, it started acquiring qualities of its very own, and evolved too much for it to go back to its roots. For example, novels started addressing issues which were far and wide, and a novel became a very generic term to describe a particular text. The availability of novels of different kinds, led to them being categorized into various sub-genres, such as romantic novels, horror novels etc. Historic novel is a sub-genre which was defined at the very beginning of its birth. It is not possible to discuss historic novel as a genre without invoking Sir Walter Scott, the pioneer of this sub-genre. We will be discussing him over the course of this paper.

Without much digression, it is important to note that for historical fiction to be qualified as literature, it has to have a certain level of literariness, a specific narrative, plot, and most importantly ‘fictionality’. This fictionality in a realistic historical context can only achieved by introducing fictional characters and their lives in the times.

Thus, a historic novel is defined as

“a novel that has as its setting a period of history and that attempts to convey the spirit, manners, and social conditions of a past age with realistic detail and fidelity (which is in some cases