Sir Walter Scott

In the twelfth grade I did a local theater production of A.R. Gurney's 'The Dining Room,' a vignette style dramatic comedy about the decline of the 20th Century W.A.S.P. society in America. There's a climactic sequence I remember, some white guy has slapped another white guy because Jesus Christ and Buddha Too, a rumor's abound that white guy one might be gay. [Hence appropriately the 'slapping'] As one white guy is carried off to the hospital, at the sequences' conclusion, his wife follows shortly with her white sons and calls to one of them, "Meet us at the doctors, bring a book, a long book, bring Ivanhoe."
I didn't get it. Now I get it.
It's easy to put Sir Walter Scott in a box, his interpretation of the lower class is not quite PC by contemporary standards, but I think his narrative approach is more irrelevant that irreverent. Meaning that I think Scott's commentary on the working classes, which may seem a tad demeaning is unintentionally so; In fact I think that Scott's narrative may be trying to romanticize the 'Drover class,' rather than convey the negative a portrayal that, today, reflects more poorly on Scott than the Drover.
His descriptions appeal to nature and the 'natural' qualities of the class system: certainly a romantic motiffe. But unfortunately, today his analogical language and alluisons to the drovers place amongst the 'herds' seems more like an elitist appeal to animalism than the beauty of nature.
"For the Highlander, a child amongst flocks, is a prince amongst herds, and his natural habits induce himt o disdain the shepherds slothful life, so that he feels himself nowhere more at home than when following a gallant drove of his country cattle in the character of their guardian."

Ok so not much need for explanation. His writing is very thoughtful, but lacks the critical thought to which modernism (particularly realism) appeals. 'A child amongst flocks' is a nearly biblical imagef Scott manages to convey without explicity allusion. 'Country cattle in the character' is a smooth use of alliteration, and the passage as a whole is rhetorically sound. Sir Walter Scott is a very good writer and clearly a thoughtful one.
However, his to his great unfortunance, modern readers will have a difficult time overlooking the dated ideals that resonate throughout almost every paragraph of his prose.