Sir Walter Scott THE BLACK DWARF (1816) Reviewed by Patrick Killough   I, for BARNES AND NOBLE Reviewer's rating of THE BLACK DWARF: * * * * *   FIVE STARS Title of this review:  The Rise and Fall of Unmerited Madness Historical background: When Walter Scott's 1816 novel THE BLACK DWARF begins, it is the year 1707. The bribed Scottish Parliament has just agreed to dissolve both itself and Scotland as a stand-alone nation. Anne, the first ruler of the brand new United Kingdom and last Stuart monarch recognized by Parliament, is ailing and at any time can die without heirs. Toward novel's end, in March 1708, a French fleet will try but fail to bring back to Scotland and set triumphantly on shore Queen Anne's half brother, the exiled Roman Catholic James VIII (of Scotland) and III (of England) to reclaim the throne of his deposed father, King James VII and II. [NOTE: Scott hews only approximately to the historical timeline.] One day a powerful, ugly, human-hating dwarf appears from nowhere amid the large rocks and scattered shards of isolated, hard to approach Mucklestane Moor on the Scottish border. He builds for himself a simple but sturdy cabin with a mere 10 foot by 6 foot interior. The hasty first impression of many locals is that the hideous little man is the fabled 'Brown Man' who appears just before all great disasters in Scottish history, sickens animals and causes crops to fail. He calls himself, to anyone brave enough to ask, Elshender the Recluse. In striking contrast he grudgingly and with loud complaints heals men and cattle, offers sound advice when it is humbly sought and is soon styled by the country people either Canny Elshie or the Wise Wight of Mucklestane Moor. After death in hoary age he will pass into legend as The Black Dwarf. Canny Elshie makes it known to the two or three local people who come to know him reasonably well that he hates the human race with a deep, undying passion. Just as no one has ever done him a good deed, so he will return the favor. Yet while he barks and snarls, he rarely bites. He heals and keeps alive men both good and bad. He does this in the firm belief that they are all so selfish, greedy and deep-down evil that, while alive, they can only play an inevitable role in the total destruction of man by man. THE BLACK DWARF is a kind of detective story. There are many questions with cleverly scattered clues. What has made the dwarf so misanthropic? Is he a onetime mighty, wealthy nobleman betrayed by a fiancee? Did he kill a man about to stab his best friend in a brawl? Did that friend for a time successfully keep the dwarf in medical confinement while he took control of his estate? Who is the tall mysterious stranger, Mr Ratcliffe, who appears from time to time at Elshie's cabin and disappears as if into thin air? Is Elshie in league with the devil? Why is Elshie kind to two young men who are good friends: the well-born but financially strained 'young Earnscliff of that ilk' and the substantial commoner farmer Halbert (Hobbie) Elliot? Could it have been Canny Elshie who had slain young Earnscliff's father nearly two decades earlier? Had the immensely strong but hideous dwarf previously been the notably wealthy Roman Catholic Sir Edward Mauley? Had he loved passionately a kinswoman who married his best friend while Sir Edward was serving a year in prison for manslaughter? If so, that might explain his unique affection for the sole offspring of that union, the kind, beautiful young woman, Miss Isabella Vere of Ellieslaw Castle. THE BLACK DWARF abounds in intrigue, as discontented Scots and border Englishmen plot to bring back King Charles VIII and III. There are saucy young women, both nobles and commoners. There are bold kidnappings, breathless pursuits and nip-of-time rescues. A major factor in this mingling of history and fiction is the self-loathing and misanthropy of Elshender the Recluse. His character shows what psychic wreckage can occur when a rich young man naturally generous is laughed at for his deformities, betrayed by best friend and fiancee, for a time loses his mind, partially recovers it and tries, almost despite himself, to right a previous taking of life. ' ... every violent passion, as well as anger, may be termed a short madness' (Ch. 15). This short novel is Scott's psychological masterpiece. - OOO- Also recommended: William Faulkner: AS I LAY DYING. Sir Walter Scott: REDGAUNTLET, THE BRIDE OF LAMMERMOOR. William Shakespeare: OTHELLO. =-=-====-=-=-=-=-=-=- II. Review for amazon.com Reviewer's rating of THE BLACK DWARF: * * * * *   Five Stars Title of this review: When and How A Rose Softened A Destructive Spirit of Madness, August 4, 2007 Sir Walter Scott's short novel of 1816, THE BLACK DWARF, begins by presenting the back side of a tapestry: colors dull, patterns obscure. Mysterious, too, but not without clues leading from one isolated insight to another. Only at novel's end is the tapestry turned and all piercingly revealed. Let's look at the mysteries as they appear to the principal female of the BLACK DWARF, beautiful teen-age Miss Isabella Vere of Ellieslaw Castle. What does she know of herself and her family? Her long dead mother is buried in the castle's chapel in a tomb of Italianate beauty (Ch. 17). Her wealthy, stern father is a political schemer, aiming to become more powerful by restoring the male line of the Stuarts. To that end he is pressuring Isabella to wed the odious Jacobite, Sir Frederick Langley. Yet Isabella herself is fonder of a young nobleman named Earnscliff. She is being visited by two cousins, Nancy and Lucy Ilderton. Lucy in particular knows that Isabella hates the one and loves the other. There is also some dark but hushed up ancient stain on Isabella's father's honor; he was almost killed in a brawl when his best friend, Sir Edward Mauley, saved his life by slaying his opponent. After a year's imprisonment for manslaughter, Sir Edward disappeared. Meanwhile Isabella's father had married Isabella's mother, a kinswoman of Sir Edward. Isabella unknowingly meets her destiny one day in 1707 riding in the wilds of Scotland near the English border with her two cousins. They come upon a tiny hut recently constructed on Mucklestane Moor. They had heard that it was built by a strong but hideous misanthropic dwarf who calls himself Elshender the Recluse. In the few months he has been there, despite his constantly invoking the deserved doom of the entire human race, he has done much grudgingly offered good to the local people by way of healing and advice. From them he has earned from the names Canny Elshie and the Wise Wight of Mucklestane Moor (Ch. 5). The dwarf dismisses with sarcasm the cousins after Lucy offers to pay to have her fortune told. But Elshender detains Miss Vere, whom he calls Isabel. He has known her parents. Does he also know her, Isabella asks. "Yes; this is the first time you have crossed my waking eyes, but I have seen you in my dreams." He added that he was no common fortune-teller but knew that her life was beset with real and potential evils. These included "unsuccessful love, crossed affections, the gloom of a convent, or an odious alliance." Her sad situation combined with her kind words to him made the ugly little man shed a rare tear. Those tears had been a good deed done to him by her. The dwarf rewarded her with a rose from his garden and the promise that if ever she needed him, she should deliver to him in person that rose or one of its petals. Who is this Wise Wight of Mucklestane Moor? Why does he except Isabella Vere from his general self-pitying loathing of the human race. It would spoil the ending to provide more clues. Suffice it to say that THE BLACK DWARF is a masterly study of what happens when a deformed but sensitive, generous young nobleman is betrayed by fiancee and best friend, loses his mind, partially recovers it and is caught up in a planned rebellion of Scots against Queen Anne and the recently created United Kingdom. -OOO- Your tags: walter scott, isabella vere, sir edward mauley, queen anne, mucklestane moor =-=-=-=-==-=-=-=-=-=-=- III. for EPINIONS TITLE OF THIS REVIEW: How Much Betrayal Can A Troubled Mind Take Before Giving Way? by aohcapablanca, Aug 04 '07 See the world of late 17th and early 18th Century Scotland from a miserably unhappy dwarf's point of view. You are Sir Edward Mauley. You were born hideously deformed to rich, loving Catholic parents. They raised with you a young kinswoman who became your willing fiancee. Your parents died in short order just before you were to wed. At that time you saved a handsome young friend and house guest from death by slaying his attacker during a drunken political dispute. You served a year in prison for manslaughter. You were wracked with guilt over this homicide. But you looked forward to a long, contented life spent with at least two friends (you had no others), the wife you were to marry within the year and the friend whose life you had saved at the cost of loss of liberty. Up to this point in your mental experiment as a reader, prospects appear on balance rather better than worse for sensitive, inward-looking Sir Edward as he emerges from prison. There are admittedly severe obstacles to future happiness. He is ugly, he knows that the world regards him as a freak and he pities himself. He is philanthropic but his lavish gifts bring him no friends. His protective parents are no longer there to shelter him. Against these negatives there are a few pluses: he is immensely wealthy, he is physically powerful, he has a brilliant mind and he has two friends whom he trusts implicitly and who mean everything to him. Yet the unthinkable occurs. His friend marries his fiancee. When Sir Edward's mind gives way in shock and grief, " ... it was as if the last cable at which the vessel rode had suddenly parted, and left her abandoned to all the wild fury of the tempest" (Ch. 15). His former friend (now his closest male kinsman through marriage) has him committed to medical restraint, keeping him isolated while he manages and to some extent plunders his rich estates. A loyal servant manages to bring Sir Edward's case before a court and gets him released from custody. His former fiancee bears a girl child to his former friend but soon dies without male issue, causing her entailed property to revert to her kinsman, Sir Edward. Years pass. The dwarf's reactions to double betrayal were not healthy. He renounced his Catholic faith. He sank into even deeper self-pity and hatred of the human race. He wandered. He lived ascetically. After a few years he disappeared completely, staying in touch only with that ever faithful servant now charged with the management of all of Sir Edward's estates. One day, for reasons which you will have to read Walter Scott's 1816 novel THE BLACK DWARF to discover, a disguised a wild looking, hideously ugly Sir Edward suddenly appeared in the Southern Scottish barrens of Mucklestane Moor. He single-handedly built a simple shelter for himself. To those local people who sought his assistance, even though fearing that he might be in league with Satan, he offered medicines, advice about their sick cattle and was otherwise helpful -- all the while cursing both them and the whole ingrate human race. He told them to call him Elshender the Recluse. One day three merry young women are out on horseback enjoying the air and views on Mucklestane Moor. They are Miss Isabella Vere, a beautiful young lady, daughter of the Lord of nearby Ellieslaw Castle, and her two worldly cousins Lucy and Nancy Ilderton, house guests at the castle. The girls know that a mysterious dwarf has been in residence on the barren moor for some months now. They also know that his ungraciously given but welcome good deeds have won him much local respect and the nicknames Canny Elshie and the Wise Wight of Mucklestane Moor. The three stop at the Dwarf's out of feminine curiosity, though ostensibly to seek directions. Lucy's request that her fortune be told is rebuffed. But the dwarf shows considerable knowledge of Isabella's family and her personal vexations. He gives her a rose from his garden and says that if she ever needs help, she need only bring him this rose or even one of its leaves. What is behind this mysterious and uncharacteristic (because unsolicited) offer of unconditional assistance? The tale goes on unraveling its mysteries while showing how a score of private lives are swept into the rising Scottish discontent of 1707 - 1708. There is nationalistic resentment of the recent creation of the United Kingdom, which abolished the ancient independence of Scotland. Unlikely parties are burying the hatchet and plotting to place an exiled male Stuart on the throne now occupied, through Act of Parliament, by his half-sister Queen Anne. Keep your eyes on a young farmer named Hobbie Elliot and his noble friend Earnscliff (Isabella is partial to him and he reciprocates, although her father had killed his father in a brawl.) There will soon be conspiracies, kidnappings, pursuits, rescues and romances. Are these characters possessed of true freedom of the will? Or are all to greater or lesser extent at the end of strings pulled by Canny Elshie who will go down in Border legend as The Black Dwarf? Read from cover to cover and enjoy this short psychological masterpiece of Sir Walter Scott. -OOO- Pros: Why does betrayal by best friends so overbalance advantages of birth, wealth, intellect and generosity? Cons: There is some melodrama plus much broad lowland Scots language -- making a glossary. The Bottom Line: Love a mystery? Want enough clues to solve it? Fascinated when six different perspectives lead eventually to the same conclusion? Then THE BLACK DWARF is for you. Overall Product Rating: * * * * *  Excellent =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Black Mountain August 4, 2007 For a good backgrounder to THE BLACK DWARF see also http://www.walterscott.lib.ed.ac.uk/works/novels/dwarf.html i.e., Synopsis "The Black Dwarf is set in the immediate aftermath of the Union between England and Scotland in 1707. The political action is centred on the first uprising to be attempted by Jacobites after the Union, the aborted landing of the exiled James Francis Edward Stuart and a large French fleet in March 1708. The dwarf of the title is Sir Edward Mauley, who, in his youth, has embraced the quarrel of his friend and kinsman Richard Vere, killing his rival the Laird of Earnscliff. While imprisoned for manslaughter, he learns that Vere has betrayed him by marrying his intended bride. He retires in misanthropical disgust to Mucklestane Moor, where his extraordinary strength, knowledge of medicine, and ready wealth lead the local people to regard him as a supernatural being in league with the Devil. Living incognito, he is known as Elshender the Recluse.  Vere lives nearby with his daughter Isabella who has fallen in love with Earnscliff's son, Patrick. Vere opposes the union, and, in order to further his Jacobite schemes, forces Isabella to consent to marriage with Sir Frederick Langley. Isabella appeals to Mauley for assistance. As Vere's expenditures have brought his lands under Mauley's control, he is able to show Langley that Isabella is penniless without his consent, and the marriage is prevented at the last minute. The Jacobite plot is discovered, and Vere and Langley flee the country. Revealing his true identity, Mauley bestows his fortune upon Isabella who marries Patrick Earnscliff. Mauley disappears and his ultimate fate remains a mystery." =-=-=-=-=-=-= For background on the ORIGINAL Black Dwarf, see http://www.theblackdwarf.co.uk/ David Ritchie (1740-1811), known also as David of Manor Water, Bow'd Davie, Crooked David, and most notably the Black Dwarf, was a dwarf born at the slate quarries of Stobo. He was the inspiration for Sir Walter Scott's novel, The Black Dwarf. He lived in a cottage on the banks of Manor Water near the town of Peebles, Scotland. 08/04/2007