Download or read book Prefacing the Waverley Prefaces written by Patricia Sullivan Gaston and published by Peter Lang Incorporated, International Academic Publishers. This book was released on 1991 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is an extended reading of both the initial and the Magnum Opus prefaces to Sir Walter Scott's Waverley novels. Instead of being poorly crafted, expendable fluff, the prefaces describe Scott's theory of the historical novel - the subgenre he «invented» - and of historiography itself. The prefaces include an intricate arrangement of authorial personae, raising the essential questions concerning historical source material and narrative authority.