Before You Begin

Before you begin.

At dawn on the wild braes of Glenartney a great stag breaks cover, and the horns and hounds of a royal hunt sweep after it into the tangled gorge of the Trosachs — until, deep among the crags, one hunter is left alone, his gallant horse spent beneath him. He winds his horn, and out of the silver water of Loch Katrine a maiden comes rowing to him in a little skiff. She is Ellen Douglas, the Lady of the Lake; the stranger names himself James Fitz-James, the Knight of Snowdoun. So begins one of the best-loved poems in the English language.

Sir Walter Scott's The Lady of the Lake, published in 1810, is a romance of the Scottish Highlands in the days of King James V — a tale of an outlawed lord and his daughter, of the proud Highland chieftain Roderick Dhu who loves her, of the gentle Malcolm Graeme whom she loves, and of a mysterious knight whose true name is the last and greatest of its secrets. Around them Scott raises the whole theatre of the clans: the Fiery Cross carried from glen to glen, the gathering of Clan Alpine, the wild seer's prophecy, and a single combat by a lonely ford that turns the whole story upon its head.

It is a poem made to be heard as much as read — Scott sets songs within it that have never fallen silent, from Ellen's Soldier, rest! to the clan's Hail to the Chief. Enjoy it first as sheer adventure, sung to the harp of the North: the chase, the island, the gathering, the prophecy, the combat, and the king unmasked at last in the guard-room of Stirling.

This illustrated edition opens with a gallery of the cast, the map of the Trosachs and Loch Katrine, and its great scenes; and as you read, the story unfolds in six visual movements — one for each canto — recap plates you unlock along the way, each gathering together the tale so far, with never a glimpse of what lies ahead. Turn the page, and follow the horn into the hills.