A former revolutionary Scotsman achieves prosperity in New York through hard work and social networking Scholarly edition that distinguishes the 1832 text from the 1830 texts and presents it with a glossary of Scottish terms and historical notes Introduction that examines Galt's techniques for combining fiction with lived experience and that provides contextual information about emigration from Scotland, political reform in Britain, and socio-economic conditions and aspirations in New York at the beginning of the nineteenth century Maps that enable readers to put together the novel's imaginary and actual locations In Lawrie Todd (1830; rev. ed. 1832), John Galt paints an optimistic portrait of Scottish emigration to North America. Designed as a fictional autobiography, the novel charts the fortunes of its protagonist from his departure from Scotland to avoid being tried for treason over his French Revolutionary sympathies to his rise to prosperity as a shopkeeper in New York City and imaginary towns near Rochester. This edition of the novel provides a contextual introduction, explanatory notes and maps that connect Todd's life story with boom times in New York and with Galt's own efforts at social entrepreneurship in Canada as well as with debates over emigration and political reforms in Britain. It sheds light on Galt's methods of characterisation, including his use of Scots and Yankee" speech habits and adaptation of real-life models, and on his popularity with readers in his own time. "

About the Author
John Galt was a Scottish novelist, entrepreneur, and political and social commentator.Regina Hewitt is Professor of English at the University of South Florida and Consulting Editor (formerly Co-Editor) of the European Romantic Review. She is the co-editor (with Michael Demson) of Commemorating Peterloo: Violence, Resilience and Claim-making during the Romantic Era (EUP, 2019) and sole editor of John Galt: Observations and Conjectures on Literature, History and Society (2012). Previous publications include Symbolic Interactions: Social Problems and Literary Interventions in the Works of Baillie, Scott and Landor (2006) and The Possibilities of Society: Wordsworth, Coleridge and the Sociological Viewpoint of English Romanticism (1997).

Reviews
"At last! A scholarly edition of Lawrie Todd, nineteenth-century best-seller and pioneering British novel of American immigration and pioneer life. A Scottish radical becomes a successful frontier businessman: John Galt's characteristic wit and bite is matched only by Regina Hewitt's imaginative editorial detective work." -Katie Trumpener, Yale University



Book Information
ISBN 9781474460576
Author John Galt
Format Hardback
Page Count 544
Imprint Edinburgh University Press
Publisher Edinburgh University Press