Theletters of Sir Walter Scott, the novelist and poet, range in date from September 1788, when he was aged 17, to June 1832, a few weeks before his death.[1][nb 1] About 7000 letters fromScott are known, and about 6500 letters addressed to him. The major repository of both is theNational Library of Scotland.H. J. C. Grierson'sThe Letters of Sir Walter Scott (1932–1937), though it includes only about 3500, remains the standard edition.
Scott's letters do not read like literary documents intended one day to be published, but like spontaneous and unstudied expressions of Scott's thoughts;[4] writing to his future wife Scott himself admitted that "I never read my letters a second time".[5] His intention seems to have been simply to entertain his correspondent, and the result can sometimes be genuinely witty.[6][7] He does not write about his novels or his business concerns, since he had chosen to keep his involvement in both confidential, nor on the whole about his private feelings,[4] though letters to his closest friends can sometimes be revelatory of his inner life, disclosing sharply contrasting aspects of his personality depending on the character of his correspondent. Even then they can be misleading as autobiographical documents, for as Scott himself wrote, "letters...exhibit the writers less as they really are, than as they desire their friends should believe them to be."[8]
Scott had a wide range of correspondents, reflecting his diverse literary and business interests and his close family life. They include writers, artists, scientists, and the great political figures of his day.[9] Figures to whom he wrote most often include his wife, Margaret Charlotte Scott; his sons Walter and Charles Scott; his son-in-lawJohn Gibson Lockhart; his sister-in-law Elizabeth McCulloch Scott; his stewardWilliam Laidlaw; hisclan chiefCharles Scott, Duke of Buccleuch; society figures Anne Hamilton, Marchioness of Abercorn andHenry James Montagu-Scott, Lord Montagu; the politiciansJohn Wilson Croker andJ. B. S. Morritt; the lawyers Charles Erskine, John Gibson, John Richardson, andJames Skene; the printerJames Ballantyne; the publishersJohn Ballantyne,Robert Cadell,Archibald Constable, andJohn Murray; the poetsJoanna Baillie,George Ellis, andMargaret Douglas-Maclean-Clephane, Marchioness of Northampton; the novelistMaria Edgeworth; the antiquariesRichard Heber,David Laing, andCharles Kirkpatrick Sharpe; and the actorDaniel Terry.[10]
Some 7000 letters from Scott are known to survive, widely scattered across the world.[9][11] About half of them are now in theNational Library of Scotland;[12] other institutions with large holdings includeNational Records of Scotland,Edinburgh University Library, theBeinecke Library, theFales Library, and theMorgan Library & Museum. Over 450 letters are known to be in private hands.[13][1]
There are also over 6500 surviving letters addressed to Scott. About 6000 of them were collected together by Scott himself and bound into letter-books; these were kept atAbbotsford by his descendants until 1921, when they were sold by auction to the novelistHugh Walpole.[14][9] Walpole bequeathed them to the National Library of Scotland, where the 46 volumes, commonly known as the Walpole collection, are officially designated NLS MSS 3874–3919.[15]
The seven-volumeMemoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Bart (1837–1838), by J. G. Lockhart, includes a large number of Scott's letters. More appeared in various publications later in the 19th century, in particularDavid Douglas's attractive two-volumeFamiliar Letters of Sir Walter Scott (1894), though Douglas's editorial practices, like Lockhart's, do not meet modern standards. Selections from the Walpole collection of letters received by Scott were published in Wilfred Partington'sThe Private Letter-Books of Sir Walter Scott (1930) andSir Walter Scott's Post-Bag (1932). From 1932 to 1937H. J. C. Grierson produced his twelve-volumeLetters of Sir Walter Scott, which put some 3500 letters into print, about half the number now known to exist.[16] This edition has never been superseded,[9] and is now available online.[17] There is also a comprehensive online catalogue of all Scott's outgoing and incoming letters, which is published by the National Library of Scotland.[9]