Reading Scott:
The Fortunes of Nigel
(Chapter 5)
Read by pupils at George Heriot's School
The passage selected from The Fortunes of Nigel Chapter 5 features an encounter between King James VI and I, and his jeweller, George Heriot. Scott's novel offers the chief, if not the only, fictional representation of Heriot in Scottish Literature, and was therefore felt to be an appropriate choice for pupils of the school which bears his name. Indeed, it was to a large extent due to the financial acumen which Heriot displayed in his business with the King - and of which we gain a flavour in the extract chosen - that he was able to accumulate the very substantial sums which he left for the founding of the school.
March 2010
George Heriot's School is believed to have inspired The Fortunes of Nigel. Scott used the school’s history and surroundings as inspiration for the fictional depiction of King James I’s court and early 17th-century Scottish society.
Angus Millar and Michael Cameron, with Jonathan Brown as Heriot and Andy Peppiette as the King
