Guy Mannering

On the auspicious night that Guy Mannering is shown to the house of the Bertrams of Ellangowan, their heir is born and Mannering, a sceptical astrologer, predicts his future. Five years later the prophecy is fulfilled, and Harry Bertram finds himself at the centre of a plot to rob him of his inheritance. Harry's subsequent struggles are set against a background of chaos and upheaval in a socially fragmented land where everyone, from landowners to gypsies, is searching for their rightful place.The text, taken from the authorative Edinburgh Edition of the Waverley Novels, follows Guy Mannering as it was first published in 1815, with the addition of significant passages from the manuscript that have been omitted from all previous editions. This volume also contains a new critical introduction and a chronology, a bibliography, historical and explanatory notes and a glossary.
On the auspicious night that Guy Mannering is shown to the house of the Bertrams of Ellengowan, the Bertrams' heir is born, and Mannering, a skeptical astrologer, predicts the child's future. Five years later the prophecy is fulfilled, and the heir, Harry Bertram, becomes the center of a plot to rob the boy of his inheritance. Harry's subsequent struggles are set against a backdrop of chaos and upheaval in a socially fragmented Scotland where everyone, from landowners to gypsies, is searching for their rightful place.
Guy Mannering is an astrologer who only half-believes in his art. Instead he places his faith in patriarchal power, wealth and social position. But the Scotland of this novel is a nation in which the old hierarchies are breaking down and Guy must learn the limits of the nabob's authority in a society in which each social group - from gypsies and smugglers, to Edinburgh lawyers, landowners and Border store farmers - lives by its own laws.