Kenilworth

As the book opens, Amy Robsart has left her family home and has secretly married Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester. Amy's father, Sir Hugh and the man her father intended her to marry, Edmund Tressilian, have no knowledge of Amy's whereabouts and suspect foul play at the hands of Dudley's sneaky master of the horse, Richard Varney, and Tressilian goes in search of Amy at an old manor house, Cumnor Place. As Elizabeth I's attraction to Dudley grows, so does Dudley's ambitions to reach for the stars and a greater place at court than he ever dared for, and Amy becomes a bit of a liability -- especially to Varney who hopes to rise in power alongside his master--and thus the game is on. This is the first Walter Scott that I have read, with the exception of Ivanhoe and that was many years ago when I was a young child. I admit to almost giving up a couple of times, as the vernacular used by the characters was hard to follow at times, but it's worth slugging through the first 50 or so pages until the story starts cooking along as Scott takes the reader on a grand ride through the court of Elizabeth Tudor. Even Walter Raleigh makes a wonderful secondary character, his characterization of Elizabeth I was spot on, and I loved the way Scott worked Dudley's famous fete of Elizabeth at his castle at Kenilworth into Amy's story. Although Scott based this tale on an old English Ballad (which is printed in the back of the book) and not known history, it's still a jolly good yarn peopled with interesting characters, poison, astrology, treachery and all the well known intrigues of the Court of Elizabeth I. Those of you who are well versed in Tudor history already know the fate of Amy Robsart and I will have to warn those potential readers who are picky about historical accuracy that Scott definitely diddles with history in this tale. But for those readers who are willing to forget what's in the history books and ready to enjoy a jolly good yarn by a master storyteller about Elizabethan England, this is one book worth checking out, and I intend to read other books by this author. Five stars.

In Sir Walter Scott's 1821 novel KENILWORTH, very young Amy Robsart of the English country gentry had once been engaged to marry a serious young scholar of Cornwall, Edmund Tressilian. But the handsome, rich, powerful Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, comes between them. Tressilian and Amy's father, Sir Hugh, know that Amy has either eloped or been carried off by someone. But they suspect ungainly Richard Varney, not the handsome, vastly wealthy Earl of Leicester. Richard Varney, as it happens, is the hugely influential right hand man of Dudley. And one of Varney's jobs is to scout out pretty women for his Puritan master to seduce. To this end Varney systematically ingratiates himself with Sir Hugh Robsart and brings his master and Miss Robsart together in clandestine meetings. Amy loves Dudley as woman has never loved man before but will not, like his other conquests, willingly go to bed with him unless and until they are married. The Earl, for his part, is smitten by Amy and impulsively weds her, over Varney's objections that he is ruining his political career. But the great Earl remains ambitious and prudent enough to keep the wedding secret until he can find a time and a way to make it known without doing harm to his rising status with his old childhood friend and onetime fellow prisoner of the Tower of London, Elizabeth Tudor. Dudley has Varney fit up splendidly as Amy's closely guarded residence a ruined abbey which Varney has been given as spoils from Henry VIII's dissolution of the monasteries. It pertains to the village of Cumnor near Oxford. The Earl hides his new wife in Cumnor Hall, where, after a search at novel's beginning, Tressilian finds her but cannot persuade her to return to her father. From that point on, the plot becomes more and more complex and the secret marriage harder to keep secret or, once discovered, to explain. Varney assures the inquisitive Queen that Amy is his wife, not Leicester's and Leicester takes his good time telling the truth. Meanwhile Varney convinces the already great Earl to do his best to win Elizabeth's hand and become King of England. The pious Earl trusts the villainous Varney to find a way to make this happen that is both effective and compatible with the Earl's Puritan conscience. Without revealing precisely what happens to love-smitten Amy Robarts, who remains devoted to Leicester through betrayal upon betrayal, let me quote her keeper's comment to Varney in the final pages of KENILWORTH on how Amy's love of her unworthy husband has scalded her: "It is a seething of the kid in the mother's milk" (Ch. 41). There are twenty or more other rounded, energetic characters whom readers will enjoy seeing pass across the stage of KENILWORTH. They include Sir Walter Raleigh and his legendary muddied cloak. There is Will Shakespeare, whose rhymes the Queen can't get out of her mind. There are other memorable real and fictional minor characters of both sexes. Walter Scott is famous for his descript

Readers of Scott know not to read for plot, for even his most highly regarded novels meander and stray wilfully from the strict path of story-telling. Kenilworth, in addition to being a typically marvelous example of Scott's allusive narrative power, also happens to be the tightest and best contrived of his plots, one of the very few of his novels where all the ends are tied together convincingly. The novel has a gloriously conveyed Elizabethan atmosphere, which it is not timid about evoking at all levels and types: there is peasant comedy, taproom humor, stately politics, an aritocratic love story, villainous alchemists, and a sort of self-taught, lesser artisan hero whom its easy to root for (Wayland Smith). If you're familiar with the movie Elizabeth, you'll recognize some of the situations in this novel. But Scott isn't particularly historically accurate here, nor is he trying to be. His source is an Elizabethan ballad, and he tries to convey that world in all its Shakespearian complexity. Overall, one of the best, one of my favorite, of the Waverley novels, finally available in a dependable, well-edited edition. Bravo Scott, bravo Penguin Classics! More please!

Kenilworth is set in 1575 during the reign of Elizabeth I. It is the story of Amy Robsart who has secretly married Robert Dudley Earl of Leicester. But Leicester is the Queen's favourite and fearful that he would lose his status if his marriage became public he keeps Amy secluded in Cumnor Hall. However, such secrets are hard to keep in an Elizabethan England full of plots and intrigues between factions vying for Elizabeth's favour and as Leicester entertains the Queen at Kenilworth castle the truth will out. As usual Scott tells a good story in Kenilworth. He takes as his point of departure the known incidents of history and weaves his plot around them. He is not always faithful to the historical record, but he captures the mood of the time. His characterisation of Elizabeth is particularly fine, showing her fair and just but swift to take offence and with a devastating temper. Scott builds great tension into his plot, because it is a story rooted in a period where one false step can bring instant downfall, where the highest can be brought to the block in an instant, if Elizabeth's capricious mood turns angry. Kenilworth is quite a difficult read. Scott's scholarship was such that he often uses the language of Elizabethan times and continually refers to historical events and literary texts which are now obscure. It is for this reason that it is important to read an edition of Scott which uses the best modern experts to clarify and explain the text. The Edinburgh Edition of the Waverley Novels, published by Edinburgh and Columbia University Press, is the definitive edition of Scott and is a stunning example of modern scholarship. The glossary is full and the notes are detailed and useful. The editor, J.H. Alexander, has gone back to Scott's original manuscript and first edition to provide a text of Kenilworth which is in a number of crucial respects different from that which has been commonly read since 1831. In the end the most important thing is that this edition makes Scott easier to read and easier to enjoy. Scott ought to be enjoyed. He was one of the most popular novelists of his day and with a little practice, reading him becomes a great pleasure. Kenilworth is quite a good place to begin an acquaintance with Scott's writing. Being set in England, it has no dialogue in the old Scots dialect, which can be difficult nowadays even for Scottish people to understand. Moreover it has a fine story with many interesting characters both virtuous and villainous. It may not be one of Scott's very greatest novels, but it is a good one and well worth reading even if at times it may be something of a struggle.

As a ardent reader of medieval England stories, this is one book which I found as entertaining and romantic as any other book I have read. It has everything from castles and Knights in horses to damsels in distress. Scott is magnificent in the portrayal of Amy as well as Sir Walter Raleigh and Elizabeth is the crown of his characterisation. A book worth reading..