SOURCE: Wilson, Patricia J. “John Galt at Work: Comments on the MS. of Ringan Gilhaize.” Studies in Scottish Literature 20 (1985): 160-76.

In the following essay, Wilson offers a stylistic analysis of Ringan Gilhaize, illuminated by Galt's manuscript of the novel.

In 1969 Ian Gordon discovered the MS. of John Galt's novel Ringan Gilhaize in the Edinburgh offices of the publishers Oliver & Boyd.¹ There it had probably lain since the publication of the three volumes on 2 May 1823. By arrangement with Oliver & Boyd the MS. on its rediscovery was deposited in the National Library of Scotland where I have been able to consult it.

The MS. is incomplete but illuminating about Galt's method of composition. He was a practised writer and novelist by the time he was working on Ringan and the novel, or “theoretical history of society,” as he preferred to call it, bears witness to that skill; always the alterations...