Literary resurrectionism

Becoming a resurrectionist, a digger-up of dead bodies, was not a conscious career choice for me. Yet, along with two colleagues, I find myself accused of just that. We occupy this position because we have recently edited and published two previously unpublished works by Sir Walter Scott: The Siege of Malta and Bizarro (Edinburgh University Press, edited by J.H. Alexander, Judy King and Graham Tulloch, £45 hb). The appearance of our edition provoked a storm in a tea- cup in Britain, beginning with the Scotsman’s weekend edition, Scotland on Sunday, and spreading from there to the Guardian, the Daily Telegraph and The Times. The storm died down quickly, but the issues remain.