Stevenson, Robert Louis Balfour (18501894)

Stevenson, Robert Louis Balfour (18501894)

Scotch novelist, essayist, and poet, known for his tales of fantasy and adventure and his romantic essays in the personal vein. His fiction includes The New Arabian Nights ( 1882), fantastic tales; Treaure Island ( 1883); The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde ( 1886); Kidnapped ( 1886); The Master of Ballantrae ( 1889); The Wrecker ( 1892); Catriona (called in the U.S. David Balfour; 1893), a sequel to Kidnapped. Among his volumes of essays are An Inland Voyage ( 1878); Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes ( 1879); The Amateur Emigrant; The Silverado Squatters ( 1883); Familiar Studies of Men and Books ( 1881); Virginibus Puerisque ( 1881). A Child's Garden of Verses ( 1885) and Underwoods ( 1887) are books of poetry, and he collaborated with W. E. Henley on the following dramas: Deacon Brodie ( 1882), Beau Austin ( 1890), and Admiral Guinea ( 1897). A Lodging for the Night, Markheim, and The Sire de Maletroit's Door are among his best-known short stories.

Stevenson, although seriously ill all his life with tuberculosis, lived adventurously, vagabonding through Belgium, France, California, and the Pacific islands. He spent his last years in Samoa, known among the natives as Tusitala, "teller of tales." He died while working on Weir of Hermiston, an unfinished novel which promised to be one of his best.