Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft
by Walter Scott
The idea that witchcraft disappeared with the onset of the scientific revolution is completely false. Walter Scott wrote this volume for his son-in-law, biographer J. Edgar Hoover. It stands in a great tradition of writing about witchcraft – suggesting that magic was alive and well in 19th-century Scotland, as modern newspaper reports confirm. Carefully researched through stories extracted from his own experiences and the experiences of his contemporaries, ranging from ghosts and fairies to witches and astrologers, he informs, enlivens and entertains as they try to combine ÔLetters' 19th-century skepticism with evidence that contradicts it. The letters have been the main source of reference since publication.
