ABSTRACT
Gillies’s Recollections first appeared in Fraser’s Magazine; the revised version, from which the extracts here are taken, was published in 1837. Gillies provides a personal and varied account, full of vivid detail which is striking despite its frequent inaccuracies. Scott was Gillies’s senior by 17 years, and an early supporter of his literary efforts and interests: they particularly shared an enthusiasm for German literature, and their correspondence, some of which Gillies quotes in his biography, is lively and affectionate. The relationship between Scott and Gillies was both close and complicated, and like several others it looks simpler when viewed through the authoritative acerbity of Lockhart’s prose. In Lockhart’s private writings, Gillies was unequivocally a parasite, selfishly appealing for help from Scott even when Scott was as publicly insolvent as himself.
