A Spy Amongst Us: Daniel Defoe's Secret Service and the Plot to End Scottish Independence

Mierowsky, Marc

ISBN 10: 0300260164 / ISBN 13: 9780300260168

Published by Yale University Press, 2026

About this Item

First US hardcover edition, with dust jacket, published by Yale University Press, 2026. In-depth history of how Daniel Defoe helped to sabotage the Scottish independence movement from the inside. 416 pages, with Index, Notes, illustrations and maps through the text, 6" x 9-1/2". Dust jacket is not price clipped. Not a remainder, not a library discard copy. No former ownership marks, no writing on the text pages. Edges of the text block are clean, binding is tight and square. Attached are some photos of the copy we have in our inventory.

Seller Inventory # 26-08839

Bibliographic Details

• Title: A Spy Amongst Us: Daniel Defoe's Secret Service and the Plot to End Scottish Independence
• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Publication Date: 2026
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0300260164
• ISBN 13: 9780300260168
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: Fine
• Dimensions: 16.2W x 23.65H x 3.99D centimeters 16.2 centimeters width by 23.65 centimeters height by 3.99 centimeters depth
• Weight: 654 grams
• Seller catalogs:
  • Espionage
  • England
  • Scotland
  • History

About this title

Synopsis

The true story of Daniel Defoe and the dirty tricks which helped bring Scotland into union with England
 
In 1706, Edinburgh was on the brink of a popular uprising. Men and women took to the streets to protest the planned union with England, fearing the end of Scottish sovereignty. But unbeknownst to the mob, a spy was in their midst—the English writer Daniel Defoe, now bankrupt and thrice pilloried, had turned a government agent.
 
Marc Mierowsky tells the dramatic story of Defoe and his fellow spies as they sabotaged the Scottish independence movement from the inside. Together they disseminated propaganda and built a network of operatives from London to the upper Highlands, providing the English government with up-to-the-minute intelligence and monitoring its adversaries’ every move.
 
Through the lives of Defoe and his ring, their handlers, and opponents, Mierowsky guides us through this shadowy underworld of espionage and propaganda—revealing a disturbing and distinctly modern political campaign.

About the Author

Marc Mierowsky is an ARC DECRA Fellow and Lecturer in English at the University of Melbourne, where he researches seventeenth- and eighteenth-century literature and intellectual history. He is an associate editor of The Cambridge Edition of the Correspondence of Daniel Defoe and coeditor of Oxford World's Classics edition of The Fortunate Mistress [Roxana].