The Waverley Novels are a long series of novels by Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832). For nearly a century, they were among the most popular and widely read novels in Europe.
Because Scott did not publicly acknowledge authorship until 1827, the series takes its name from Waverley, the first novel of the series, released in 1814. The later books bore the words "by the author of Waverley" on their title pages.
The Tales of my Landlord sub-series was not advertised as "by the author of Waverley" and thus is not always included as part of the Waverley Novels series.
1547–75: The Monastery, The Siege of Malta, The Abbot, Kenilworth (4)
1616–18: The Fortunes of Nigel
1644–89: A Legend of Montrose, Woodstock, Peveril of the Peak, The Tale of Old Mortality, The Pirate (5)
1700–99: The Black Dwarf, The Bride of Lammermoor, Rob Roy, Heart of Midlothian, Waverley, Guy Mannering, Redgauntlet, The Antiquary (8)
19th century: St. Ronan's Well
Editions
The novels were all originally printed by James Ballantyne on the Canongate in Edinburgh. James Ballantyne was the brother of one of Scott's close friends, John Ballantyne ("Printed by James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co., Edinburgh").
There are two definitive editions. One is the "Magnum Opus", a 48-volume set published between 1829 and 1833 by Robert Cadell, based on previous editions, with new introductions and notes by Scott. This was the basis of almost all subsequent editions until the appearance of the standard modern edition, the Edinburgh Edition of the Waverley Novels, a 30-volume set, based on early-edition texts emended mainly from the surviving manuscripts, published by Edinburgh University Press between 1993 and 2012.
The unincorporated community of Ellerslie, Georgia is believed to be named for a character in the novels, Captain Ellerslie.[5]
In Australia, the Melbourne suburbs of Glen Waverley and Mount Waverley and also Ivanhoe, were named after the novels as well.[6] The Sydney suburb of Waverley is also named after the novel.
In New Zealand there is a suburb in Dunedin and a North Island town in the province of Taranaki called Waverley.
^The first series of Chronicles of the Canongate contained two short stories ('The Highland Widow' and 'The Two Drovers'), and a short novel The Surgeon's Daughter, set in the second half of the 18th century, partly in India.
^A further novel, The Siege of Malta, set in the Mediterranean in 1565, and an incomplete novella Bizarro, set in Calabria in the first two decades of the 19th century, were first published in 2008.