Rob Roy

Last night I finished the first book in my 2008 reading challenge, Rob Roy by Sir Walter Scott. In January 2007 I read Waverly, which has many similar features. I believe these were Scott’s first and second novels. Rob Roy is among his most popular. The story doesn’t center on Rob Roy, a Scottish folk hero often compared with Robin Hood, and he doesn’t even put in an official appearance until the middle of the book. He has his hands full toward the end of the tale, however, doing quite a lot of Scott’s work for him if you want to know the truth. I am wondering if Scott chose the title to help the book’s sales: as I understand it, Rob Roy was a romantic figure in the 19th Century, a "box office draw" as it were.

The tale concerns Frank Osbaldistone, the son of a successful and wealthy English merchant who does not want to enter his father’s business but to write poetry instead. Father and son quarrel, and Osbaldistone senior packs young Frank off to the estate of his brother (Sir Hildebrand O.) in Northumberland, near the Scottish border, accepting one of his brother’s sons, Rashleigh, the evil one (naturally) into his business instead. Upon arriving at Osbaldistone Manor, young Frank promptly falls in love with the alluring Diana Vernon, who is pledged to marry one of Sir Hildebrand’s sons through a family pact. Darn! Will Frank and Diana marry? Will Rashleigh ruin Frank’s father? Will Rob Roy rescue the reader from Sir Walter’s cumbersome and contrived plot??

I won’t tell.

But, I will make a few observations about my response to the story. Okay, the plot is awful. And so, I have to say, is the Scottish dialect, which is so hard to follow my Folio Society edition (lovely book!) includes a glossary of Scottish words, which, while helpful, hardly reduced the irritation of wading through dialog featuring characters like Andrew Fairservice and Bailie Nicol Jarvie. These are two of the funniest people in the story, but the humor was somewhat diminished for me by my struggles to follow what they are saying. On the other hand, when he isn’t Scotching things up, Scott’s prose is a sheer delight, worth the price of admission, even if it weren’t for the lovely Diana, who is a lot of fun. She isn’t all that believable, honestly, but as at least one critic (A.N. Wilson?) observed many readers just love the idea of Diana. I did.

The story is quite humorous, with lots of physical comedy, though it isn’t all fun and games. Scott does a masterful job depicting the Scottish people and providing gorgeous descriptions of Scotland itself. It is also said to have significant autobiographical elements, the relationship between Frank and his father William bearing more than a passing resemblence to that of Scott and his own father. Scott had no head for business, and eventually faced financial ruin despite the extraordinary success of his novels. Those interested in ghosts (Eloise!) should pay careful attention to Andrew Fairservice’s remarks about seeing a “bogle,” which apparition makes a subsequent reappearance.

Toward the end, Scott more or less gives up and simply tells the reader how everything turns out, which diminishes the fun somewhat, but the tale is still an enjoyable romp for all that.

Dangerous Reading Commences

I began my Year of Reading Dangerously challenge like a good lad on January 1, making a start on Rob Roy. In all fairness, what I am really doing is more of a TBR challenge, but a few of the books might be considered dangerous. :-) I have a lovely Folio Society edition of the book, and have read the Introduction by Alan Massie (quite interesting and well written) and the first seven chapters thus far. I must say I find the book quite easy going compared with Waverly, which I read in January 2007. Scott’s imagery is a treat, and the characters are thus far interesting. Much has been said, from a critical perspective, concerning the unreality of the characterization, which may well be, but the book is still fun.

I was anticipating something like the movie with Liam Niessen, but have quickly realized Scott’s novel and the Hollywood production have about one thing in common: the title.

One difficulty with Scott are frequent topical references to historical figures, events, art, literature, and the like which are not part of the common idiom today. I look on these as interesting research subjects and have been keeping track of them with the assistance of a note form in the shape of a bookmark.

I made these with Microsoft Word by setting up a landscape page with three columns, adding a 1/2 point border under all the paragraphs ( I inserted enough paragraphs to fill all three columns). The top two lines in each column include space for the author's name and book title. The rest of the lines in the column are divided into three parts (for page number, phrase, and date) using two thin vertical autoshapes set as solid white with no border. This last bit is not intuitive, but is a quick way to create separate entry fields.

I set the margins to 1/2 inch on all sides. The column gutters automatically size at 1/2 inch. I checked the option for a line between each column to make an easy cutting guide. The lines won’t actually appear until the paragraphs are inserted. I made these wide enough to accommodate phrases of a few words or more, which makes it easy to recall the particular idea that presented itself while reading. Making a quick reference like this doesn’t interrupt the narrative flow significantly, which is another advantage.

Here is an image of one bookmark. They print three per sheet and are then cut apart.

Is This Dangerous Reading?

I’ve been surfing around looking for cool blogs on reading and have found a few, most notably Eloise by the Books Piles, which is absolutely charming and first-rate. A “must see” for readers. Eloise led me to Ex Libris, which led in turn to Estellas Revenge: A ‘zine about books and the My Year of Reading Dangerously Challenge.

The challenge is to read one intimidating or dangerous book per month during 2008, and the Estella article linked above includes a list of 12 official titles, but also encourages readers who want to develop their own list to do so.

Like I needed encouragement to go my own way? :-)

I decided to pick 12 books already in our house. This isn’t the limiting factor some might suppose — we have literally thousands of titles begging to be read. In fact, whenever I start doing housework, straightening things up, putting books away, etc., it is hard not to notice some interesting book which has languished on a shelf for years, pick it up for a quick perusal, and let an hour slip by before I feel the eyes of Elly on the back of my neck and hear an amused (and mildly chagrined) comment along the lines of “So this is where you have gotten off to.” Last Sunday, for example, I was lead astray by The Letters of E.B. White. (What self-respecting reader could resist such temptation?)

Anyway, here is my list of 12. These aren’t necessarily dangerous — as long as I’m not reading them when I should be doing chores — they are just books I have meant to read, or reread, and have actually acquired copies of through the years, but have somehow not made time for them. Also, while novels predominate, several works of nonfiction are included, not necessarily with any rhyme or reason but simply because when I wandered through the house picking out titles they caught my eye.

January: Rob Roy by Sir Walter Scott.
February: The Faerie Queen by Edmund Spenser.
March: Don Quixote by Miguel De Cervantes.
April: The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne.
May: The Voyage of the Beagle by Charles Darwin.
June: Moby Dick by Herman Melville.
July: Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain.
August: Boswell's Life of Johnson by James Boswell.
September: Middlemarch by George Eliot.
October: Barchester Towers by Anthony Trollop.
November: The Wings of the Dove by Henry James.
December: The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens.

And now Samba has arrived to remind me it is well past his dinner time...