Abstract
Perhaps hundreds of biographies of Sir Walter Scott were published. Some are very long, some are just short articles, but the best of Scott's modern biographers have something in common - they all read the complete collection of original sources including Scott's manuscripts and also the very first two biographies written by John Gibson Lockhart and James Hogg.
No matter how biased and imprecise they may seem now, they are still very useful as personal sources and are true basics for any Scott scholar, as they affected the perception of Scott's figure in history and society and thus affected his cultural legacy. There is also an interesting story behind these two very different biographies, which were written at almost same time, but under very different circumstances, and by two very different authors, who were once best friends and also Scott's close friends.
It is essential to make clear the story of Scott's, Lockhart's and Hogg's mutual friendship to help us understand how Scott's first biographies were written and how to adopt a right attitude to them now.