Quentin Durward
1823
Quentin Durward
1823
Translated by A.-J.-B. (Auguste-Jean-Baptiste) Defauconpret
A young Scottish archer arrives at the court of Louis XI, the most cunning and dangerous king in fifteenth-century Europe, with nothing but his bow and his honor. What he finds there will test both. Quentin Durward has come to France seeking fortune, but instead finds himself entangled in the spider's web of Louis XI's court - a world of poisoned crowns, false friends, and political assassinations where every handshake hides a dagger. The Scottish archer must navigate treacherous nobles, a forbidden romance, and the King's own paranoid brilliance while trying to preserve his integrity in a world where integrity gets you killed. Walter Scott essentially invented the historical novel, and Quentin Durward remains a masterwork of the form: a gripping adventure that also paints a portrait of an age when politics was blood sport and survival required the cunning of a fox and the courage of a lion. For readers who love historical fiction with real intellectual weight, vivid period texture, and a hero worth rooting for.
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“When I reflect with what slow and limited supplies the stream of science hath hitherto descended to us, how difficult to be obtained by those most ardent in its search, how certain to be neglected by all who regard their ease; how liable to be diverted, altogether dried up, by the invasions of barbarism; can I look forward without wonder and astonishment to the lot of a succeeding generation on whom knowledge will descend like the first and second rain, uninterrupted, unabated, unbounded; fertilizing some grounds, and overflowing others; changing the whole form of social life; establishing and overthrowing religions; erecting and destroying kingdoms.””
— Walter Scott
“I will bestow them in good works and masses for the benefit of thy soul,” said Quentin.“Name not that word again,” said Hayraddin, his countenance assuming a dreadful expression; “there is”
— Walter Scott
