Croftangry’s Narrative

Abstract

A story-like preface to Chronicles of the Canongate, ‘Croftangry’s Narrative’ is at once a primer for aspiring writers, young or old, and a subtle career retrospective of the country’s most famous author, the man behind the mask of Waverley. Chrystal Croftangry embodies the complications faced by a would-be writer in a period of pronounced partisanship. He claims to sit on the borders of two post-Union Scotlands, one in which the Jacobite risings could now be safely romanticised, and one in which they have fallen into misleading mythology. The extent to which he can successfully navigate his identity as a modern Scot, in such a diverse country, bears the burden of the narrative. Often this burden leads him to make pompous assertions about himself, and to patronise others. Rather than outright satirise the figure of the modern author, I wish to argue, Scott spotlights the hidden difficulties faced by his and upcoming generations. Like Scott, Croftangry searches for the right audience. But what is the right audience?