A wee bit about Robert Louis Stevenson...

Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson was a 19^th century writer. Born in Edinburgh Scotland in 1850, he suffered from poor health due to tuberculosis all his life. He is most famous for the books Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Stevenson loved to travel and his wanderings inspired his writing. (He is mentioned here with respect to his authorship of Jekyll and Hyde.)

The family profession was lighthouse engineering, but it did not really interest him. He attended Edinburgh University and studied engineering to please his parents, but later changed to the study of law. He felt drawn to be a writer and finally, near the end of his schooling he started doing travel writing. He became known as a master story teller writing fiction and non-fiction, travelogues, essays, and poetry, but was best known as a hero of the adventure tale.

One of his most famous works, Treasure Island, was inspired by a drawing Stevenson made for his 12 yr. old stepson. He drew a pirate map for him and then started telling pirate stories about it. The tale was later serialized in a magazine and his fame began to grow.

In 1888, The Stevenson family, he and his wife, and two stepchildren, traveled to San Francisco, and many islands in the Pacific Ocean for three years stopping in such places as Hawaii, Gilbert Islands, Tahiti, and Samoa. They decided to settle in Samoa and built a home there. Stevenson thought the island setting was good for his health and for his imaginative writing. His South Seas writing showcases his talent and he became a famous author. His adventure books are still very popular, today.

Near the end of his life, because of his poor health, Robert Louis Stevenson moved to Samoa and he eventually died there. The Island people referred to him as "Tusitala": The 'Teller of Tales'. Before he died he composed a requiem to be carved on his own gravestone-

"Under the wide and starry sky,

Dig the grave and let me lie.

Glad did I live and gladly die,

And I laid me down with a will."

"This be the verse you grave for me;

Here he lies where he longed to be;

Home is the sailor, home from the sea

And the hunter home from the hill."

Stevenson's house in Valima, Samoa.

Information from Www.biography.com and other sources.