Sir Walter Scott’s depiction of chivalric culture in Ivanhoe

Abstract

Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe, although set in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest, actually serves as an educative example where the author uses chivalry to remind his contemporaries of similar problems that occurred at an earlier stage in history and attempts to enlighten people of the revolutionary 19th century about the contemporary issues. The aim of this thesis is to investigate, on the basis of textual evidence form Ivanhoe, how Scott tempers romance with medieval elements of the novel to mirror his position on such topics like the class-divided society of England, the unification of Scotland and England, the Peterloo Crisis, the modern oppression of the Jews as well as the image of a 19th century woman. The main body of the thesis is divided into an introduction, two main chapters and a conclusion. The introduction gives a general overview of what historical fiction is, demonstrates Scott connection to the creation of the genre, discusses Scott as a writer and states the aim of the thesis. The first chapter begins analysing social aspects of Scott’s interests by discussing the Medieval Revival, Scott’s influence on this phenomenon as well as the class-divided society of England. The second subsection gives an overview of Scott’s political views on the unification of Scotland and England, the Peterloo Crisis as well as the oppression of the Jews and discusses Scott’s response for how to cope with the resulted instability. The final subsection of the theoretical chapter provides the reader with the idea of how Scott perceives women as well as their role in society. The second chapter is also divided into subsections and will analyse episodes from Ivanhoe according to the division in the first theoretical chapter. The main body of the thesis ends with a conclusion where the main ideas from the whole thesis are compiled into a conclusion.