Saint Ronan’s Well

The Edinburgh edition of Walter Scott’s Waverley novels presents an edition for modern readers incorporating an essay on the text, an emendation list, explanatory notes and a glossary. This edition hopes to bring to its audience what the first readers might have been offered had the process of transmission from manuscript to print not been so hastily performed. The edition will be in 30 volumes, published at a rate of two or three a year. This volume presents Saint Ronan’s Well . Set in Scotland, at the beginning og the 19th century, Scott’s story turns its back upon the wars waging on the world’s stage and presents a regency comedy of humours. Meg Dodd, a sentimental virago, keeps a run-down inn in a derelict Tweedale village while the young Laird is living way beyond his means. When a nearby mineral spring becomes a spa, life changes as a post-office, a hotel and a troop of social climbers move in. In a climate of tantrums, black humour, theatricals, gaming and duels, the plot unfolds. This edition reveals Scott’s intended ending. In the original published version, in order to please the sensibilities of his publisher, Scott changed the plot to allow his heroine to die with her virtue intact. An essay on the text and explanatory notes are incorporated.