"Never in Bedlam?": Madness and History in Sir Walter Scott's "The Heart of Mid-Lothian"

When introducing the anecdote of the madwoman, Scott writes of having "had madmen on my hand" in the past (Journal, 450), but he also had a madman as his hand, and he created madmen and madwomen by his hand, characters who have been described as the "unreadable core" of his novels.5 Such characters have attracted attention for the disproportionate influence they wield in their respective narratives, and for the way their traumatized and fragmented memories puncture the nostalgia of Scott's historical vision.6 If recent decades have seen an increasing recognition of the anti-Enlightenment, irrational qualities in Scott's fiction, his madmen and madwomen have played an important role in this development.7 Scott's life coincided with a crucial period of change in the way that mental incapacity was perceived, treated, and legislated for in Britain. The reading of The Heart of MidLothian that will be offered over the coming pages cuts against the traditional identification of unity in Scott's historical imagination,9 instead corroborating more recent scholarly accounts that emphasize its impurity.10 Whether such impurity deprives Scott's mad characters of purpose or, conversely, grants them authority,11 it necessitates that their condition be read not only with reference to the past but also in relation to its discursive potential in Scott's present.\n When the chapter ends, she leaves Richmond "with the feeling of one who walks in her sleep," Scott's language again invoking the possibility of temporary delusion (Mid-Lothian, 341).