Biography 2
Robert
Louis Balfour Stevenson
(13 November 1850–3 December 1894), was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist and
travel
writer. He was the man who "seemed to pick the right word up on the
point of his pen, like a man playing spillikins",
as G. K. Chesterton put it.[1] Stevenson was greatly admired by many authors, including
Jorge Luis Borges, Ernest
Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling, Vladimir
Nabokov,[2] and J. M. Barrie.[3]
Early
life
Stevenson
was born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson[4] at 8 Howard Place, Edinburgh,
Scotland, on 13 November 1850, to Thomas
Stevenson (1818-1887), a leading lighthouse engineer, and his wife
Margaret, born Margaret Isabella Balfour (1829-1897).[5] Lighthouse design was the family profession: Thomas's
own father was the famous Robert Stevenson, and his
maternal grandfather, Thomas Smith, and brothers Alan
and David were also among those in the business.[6] On Margaret's side, the family were gentry, tracing
their name back to an Alexander Balfour, who held the lands of Inchrye in Fife in the fifteenth
century. Her father, Lewis Balfour (1777-1860), was a minister of the Church of Scotland at nearby Colinton,[7] and Stevenson spent the greater part of his boyhood
holidays in his house. "Now I often wonder", says Stevenson,
"what I inherited from this old minister. I must suppose, indeed, that he
was fond of preaching sermons, and so am I, though I never heard it maintained that
either of us loved to hear them."[8]
Both
Balfour and his daughter had a "weak chest" and often need to stay in
warmer climates for their health. Stevenson inherited a tendency to coughs and
fevers, exacerbated when the family moved to a damp and chilly house at 1
Inverleith Terrace in 1853. The family moved again to the sunnier 17 Heriot Row
when Stevenson was six, but the tendency to extreme sickness in winter remained
with him until he was eleven. Illness would be a recurrent feature of his adult
life, and left him extraordinarily thin.[9] Contemporary views were that he had tuberculosis,
but more recent views are that it was bronchiectasis[10] or even sarcoidosis.[11]
Stevenson's
parents were both devout and serious presbyterians, but the household was not
unusually strict. His nurse, Alison Cunningham (known as Cummy), was more
fervently religious. Her Calvinism and folk beliefs were an early source of
nightmares for the child; and he showed a precocious concern for religion.[12] But she also cared for him tenderly in illness, reading
to him as he lay sick in bed from Bunyan and the bible, and telling tales of
the Covenanters.
Stevenson recalled this time of sickness in the poem "The Land of
Counterpane" in A Child's Garden of Verses (1885)[13] and dedicated the book to his nurse.[14]
An only
child, strange looking and eccentric, Stevenson found it hard to fit in when he
was sent to a nearby school at six, a pattern repeated at eleven, when he went
on to the Edinburgh Academy; but he mixed well in lively
games with his cousins in summer holidays at the Colinton manse.[15] In any case, his frequent illnesses often kept him away
from his first school, and he was taught for long stretches by private tutors.[16] He was a late reader, first learning at seven or eight;
but even before this he dictated stories to his mother and nurse.[17] Throughout his childhood he was compulsively writing
stories. His father was proud of this interest: he had himself written stories
in his spare time until his own father found them and told him to "give up
such nonsense and mind your business".[18] He paid for the printing of Robert's first publication
at sixteen, an account of the covenanters' rebellion, published on its two
hundredth anniversary, The Pentland Rising: a Page of History, 1666
(1866).[19]
It was
expected that Stevenson's writing would remain a sideline; and in November 1867
he entered the University of Edinburgh to study
engineering. He showed from the start no enthusiasm for his studies and devoted
much energy to avoiding lectures. His time was more important for the
friendships he made: with other students in the Speculative Society (an exclusive debating
club), particularly with Charles Baxter, who would become Stevenson's financial
agent; and with one professor, Fleeming
Jenkin, whose house staged amateur drama in which Stevenson took part, and
whose biography he would later write.[20] Perhaps most important at this point in his life was a
cousin, Robert Alan Mowbray Stevenson (known as "Bob"), a lively and
light hearted young man, who instead of the family profession had chosen to
study art.[21] Each year during vacations, Stevenson travelled to
inspect the family's engineering works – to Anstruther
and Wick
in 1868, with his father on his official tour of Orkney and Shetland
islands lighthouses in 1869, for three weeks to the island of Earraid in 1870.
He enjoyed the travels, but more for the material they gave for his writing
than for any engineering interest: the voyage with his father pleased him
because a similar journey of Walter Scott with Robert Stevenson had provided the
inspiration for The Pirate.[22] In April 1871, he announced to his father his decision
to pursue a life of letters. Though the elder Stevenson was naturally
disappointed, the surprise cannot have been great, and Stevenson's mother
reported that he was "wonderfully resigned" to his son's choice. To
provide some security, it was agreed that Stevenson should read Law (again at
Edinburgh University) and be called to the Scottish bar.[23] In a poem he later wrote for Underwood's Magazine, he
commented on his family's response to his decision, writing:
Say not
of me that weakly I declined
The labours of my sires, and fled the sea,
The towers we founded and the lamps we lit,
But rather say: In the afternoon of time
A strenuous family dusted from its hands
The sand of granite, and beholding far
Along the sounding coast its pyramids
And tall memorials catch the dying sun,
Smiled well content, and to this childish task
Around the fire addressed its evening hours.
[24]
Marriage
and travels
The
next four years were spent mostly in travel and in search of a climate that would
be more beneficial for his health. He made long and frequent trips to Fontainebleau,
Barbizon, Grez, and Nemours, becoming
a member of the artists' colonies there, as well as to Paris to visit galleries
and the theatres. It was during this period he made most of his lasting
friendships and met his future wife, Fanny
Vandegrift Osbourne, an American who was 10 years his senior and married at
the time. Among his friends were Sidney
Colvin, his biographer and literary agent; William Ernest Henley, a collaborator in
dramatic composition; Mrs. Sitwell, who helped him through a religious crisis;
and Andrew
Lang, Edmund Gosse, and Leslie
Stephen, all writers and critics. He also made the journeys described in An
Inland Voyage and Travels with a Donkey in the
Cévennes. In addition, he wrote 20 or more articles and essays for
various magazines. Although it seemed to his parents that he was wasting his
time and being idle, in reality he was constantly studying to perfect his style
of writing and broaden his knowledge of life, emerging as a man
of letters.
Stevenson paces in his dining room in an 1885 portrait by John Singer Sargent. His wife Fanny, seated in
an Indian dress, is visible in the lower right corner.
Stevenson
and Fanny Vandegrift Osbourne met in France in 1876. A few months later, when
she returned to her home in San Francisco, California, Stevenson determined
to follow. His friends advised against the journey, knowing his father's
temper, but he sailed without notifying his parents. He took steerage passage
on the Devonian,
in part to save money, but also to learn how others travelled and to increase
the adventure of the journey. From New York City he travelled overland by train
to California. He later wrote about the experience in An Amateur Emigrant and Across
the Plains. Although it was good experience for his literature,
it broke his health, and he was near death when he arrived in Monterey. He was nursed back to health by some
ranchers there.
By
December of 1879 he had recovered his health enough to continue to San
Francisco, where for several months he struggled "all alone on forty-five
cents a day, and sometimes less, with quantities of hard work and many heavy
thoughts,"[25] in an effort to support himself through his writing,
but by the end of the winter his health was broken again, and he found himself
at death's door. Vandegrift — now divorced and recovered from her own illness —
came to Stevenson's bedside and nursed him to recovery. "After a
while," he wrote, "my spirit got up again in a divine frenzy, and has
since kicked and spurred my vile body forward with great emphasis and success."[26] When his father heard of his condition he cabled him
money to help him through this period.
In May,
1880, Stevenson married Fanny although, as he said, he was "a mere
complication of cough and bones, much fitter for an emblem of mortality than a
bridegroom."[27] With his new wife and her son, Lloyd,
he travelled north of San Francisco to Napa Valley, and spent a summer honeymoon at
an abandoned mining camp on Mount Saint Helena. He wrote about this
experience in The Silverado Squatters. He met Charles Warren Stoddard, co-editor of the Overland
Monthly and author of South Sea Idylls, who urged Stevenson to
travel to the south Pacific, an idea which would return to him many years
later. In August 1880 he sailed with his family from New York back to Britain,
and found his parents and his friend Sidney
Colvin on the wharf at Liverpool, happy to see him return home. Gradually his new
wife was able to patch up differences between father and son and make herself a
part of the new family through her charm and wit.
Attempted
settlement in Europe
Portrait by John Singer Sargent, 1887.
For the
next seven years between 1880 and 1887 Stevenson searched in vain for a place of
residence suitable to his state of health. He spent his summers at various
places in Scotland and England, including Westbourne, Dorset, a residential area in Bournemouth.
There he lived in a dwelling he renamed Skerryvore
after a lighthouse, the tallest in Scotland, built by his uncle Alan
Stevenson many years earlier. For his winters, he escaped to sunny France,
and lived at Davos-Platz and the Chalet de Solitude at Hyeres, where, for
a time, he enjoyed almost complete happiness. "I have so many things to
make life sweet for me," he wrote, "it seems a pity I cannot have
that other one thing — health. But though you will be angry to hear it, I
believe, for myself at least, what is is best. I believed it all through my
worst days, and I am not ashamed to profess it now."[28] In spite of his ill health he produced the bulk of his
best known work: Treasure Island, his first widely popular book;
Kidnapped; The Strange Case of Dr.
Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the story which established his wider reputation;
and two volumes of verse, A Child's Garden of Verses and Underwoods.
At Skerryvore he gave a copy of Kidnapped to his dear friend and
frequent visitor, Henry James.[29]
Stevenson's "Cure Cottage" in Saranac Lake.
Journey
to the Pacific
On the
death of his father in 1887, Stevenson felt free to follow the advice of his
physician to try a complete change of climate. He started with his mother and
family for Colorado;
but after landing in New York they decided to spend the winter at Saranac Lake, in the Adirondacks.
During the intensely cold winter Stevenson wrote a number of his best essays,
including Pulvis
et Umbra, he began The Master of Ballantrae, and
lightheartedly planned, for the following summer, a cruise to the southern
Pacific Ocean. "The proudest moments of my life," he wrote,
"have been passed in the stern-sheets of a boat with that romantic garment
over my shoulders."[30]
In June
1888, Stevenson chartered the yacht Casco and set sail with his family
from San Francisco. The vessel "plowed her path of snow across the empty
deep, far from all track of commerce, far from any hand of help."[31] The salt sea air and thrill of adventure for a time
restored his health; and for nearly three years he wandered the eastern and
central Pacific, visiting important island groups, stopping for extended stays
at the Hawaiian Islands where he became a good friend of
King David Kalakaua, with whom Stevenson spent much time.
Furthermore, Stevenson befriended the king's niece Princess Victoria
Kaiulani, who was of Scottish heritage. He also spent time at the Gilbert
Islands, Tahiti
and the Samoan Islands. During this period he completed The Master of Ballantrae, composed two
ballads based on the legends of the islanders, and wrote The
Bottle Imp. The experience of these years is preserved in his various
letters and in The
South Seas. A second voyage on the Equator followed in 1889 with Lloyd
Osbourne accompanying them.
It was
also from this period that one particular open letter stands as testimony to
his activism and indignation at the pettiness of such 'powers that be' as a
Presbyterian minister in Honolulu named Rev. Dr. Hyde. During his time in the
Hawaiian Islands, Stevenson had visited Molokai and the leper colony there,
shortly after the demise of Father Damien. When Dr. Hyde wrote a letter to a
fellow clergyman speaking ill of Father Damien, Stevenson wrote a scathing open letter of rebuke to Dr. Hyde. Soon afterwards in
April 1890 Stevenson left Sydney on the Janet Nicoll and went on his
third and final voyage among the South Seas islands.[32]
Last years
In 1890
he purchased four hundred acres (about 1.6 square kilometres) of land in Upolu, one of the
Samoan islands. Here, after two aborted attempts to visit Scotland, he
established himself, after much work, upon his estate, which he named Vailima
("Five Rivers"). Stevenson himself adopted the native name Tusitala.
His influence spread to the natives who consulted him for advice, and he soon
became involved in local politics. He was convinced the European officials
appointed to rule the natives were incompetent, and after many futile attempts
to resolve the matter, he published A
Footnote to History. This was such a stinging protest against
existing conditions that it resulted in the recall of two officials, and
Stevenson feared for a time it would result in his own deportation. When things
had finally blown over he wrote a friend, "I used to think meanly of the
plumber; but how he shines beside the politician!"[33]
In
addition to building his house and clearing his land and helping the natives in
many ways, he found time to work at his writing. In his enthusiasm, he felt
that "there was never any man had so many irons in the fire."[34] He wrote The Beach of Falesa, Catriona
(titled David Balfour in the USA),[35] The Ebb-Tide, and the Vailima
Letters, during this period.
For a
time during 1894 Stevenson felt depressed; he wondered if he had exhausted his
creative vein and completely worked himself out. He wrote that he had
"overworked bitterly".[36] He felt more clearly that, with each fresh attempt, the
best he could write was "ditch-water".[37] He even feared that he might again become a helpless
invalid. He rebelled against this idea: "I wish to die in my boots; no
more Land of Counterpane for me. To be drowned, to be shot, to be thrown from a
horse — ay, to be hanged, rather than pass again through that slow dissolution."[38] He then suddenly had a return of his old energy and he
began work on Weir of Hermiston. "It's so good that it
frightens me," he is reported to have exclaimed[citation needed]. He
felt that this was the best work he had done. He was convinced, "sick and well,
I have had splendid life of it, grudge nothing, regret very little ... take it
all over, damnation and all, would hardly change with any man of my time."[39]
Stevenson's tomb on Mt. Vaea
Without
knowing it, he was to have his wish fulfilled. During the morning of 3 December
1894, he had worked hard as usual on Weir of Hermiston. During the
evening, while conversing with his wife and straining to open a bottle of wine,
he suddenly exclaimed, "What's that!" He then asked his wife,
"Does my face look strange?" and collapsed beside her.[40] He died within a few hours, probably of a cerebral haemorrhage, at the age of 44. The
natives insisted on surrounding his body with a watch-guard during the night,
and on bearing their Tusitala (Samoan
for "Story Writer") upon their shoulders to nearby Mount Vaea
and buried him on a spot overlooking the sea.[41] A tablet was placed there, which bore the inscription
of his 'Requiem', the piece he always had intended as his epitaph:
|
“ |
Under the
wide and starry sky, Glad did I live and gladly die, |
” |
References
1. ^ Chesterton,
Gilbert Keith (1913). The Victorian Age in Literature. London: Henry Holt and
Co., 246.
2. ^ Dillard,
R. H. W. (1998). Introduction to Treasure Island. New York: Signet
Classics, xiii. ISBN
0-451-52704-6.
3. ^ Chaney,
Lisa (2006). Hide-and-seek with Angels: The Life of J. M.
Barrie. London: Arrow Books. ISBN
0-099-45323-1.
4. ^ At about
18, Stevenson changed the spelling of 'Lewis' to 'Louis', and in 1873 he
dropped 'Balfour': Mehew (2004). The spelling 'Lewis' is said to have been
rejected because his father violently disliked another person of the same name,
and the new spelling was not accompanied by a change of pronunciation: Balfour
(1901) I, 29 n. 1.
5. ^ Furnas
(1952), 23-4; Mehew (2004).
6. ^ Paxton
(2004).
7. ^ Balfour
(1901), 10-12; Furnas (1952), 24; Mehew (2004).
8. ^ Memories and Portraits (1887), Chapter VII. The Manse.
9. ^ Furnas
(1952), 25-8; Mehew (2004).
10. ^ Holmes,
Lowell (2002). Treasured Islands: Cruising the South Seas with
Robert Louis Stevenson. Sheridan House, Inc. ISBN
1-574-09130-1.
11. ^ Sharma
OP (2005). "Murray Kornfeld, American College Of Chest Physician, and
sarcoidosis: a historical footnote: 2004 Murray Kornfeld Memorial Founders
Lecture". Chest 128 (3): 1830–5. doi:.
PMID 16162793.
12. ^ Furnas
(1952), 28-32; Mehew (2004).
13. ^ Available
at Bartleby and
elsewhere.
14. ^ Furnas
(1952), 29; Mehew (2004).
15. ^ Furnas
(1952), 34-6; Mehew (2004). Alison Cunningham's recollection of Stevenson
balances the picture of an over sensitive child, "like other bairns,
whiles very naughty": Furnas (1952), 30.
16. ^ Mehew
(2004).
17. ^ Mehew
(2004).
18. ^ Paxton
(2004).
19. ^ Balfour
(1901) I, 67; Furnas (1952), 43-5.
20. ^ Furnas
(1952), 51-54, 60-62; Mehew (2004).
21. ^ Balfour
(1901) I, 86-8; 90-4; Furnas (1952), 64-9.
22. ^ Balfour
(1901) I, 70-2; Furnas (1952), 48-9; Mehew (2004).
23. ^ Balfour
(1901) I, 85-6.
24. ^ Stevenson,
Robert Louis. The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson. Eds. Charles Curtis Bigelow
and Temple Scott. Vol. VIII. New York: Davos, 1906.
26. ^ "To
Edmund Gosse, Monterey, Monterey Co., California, 8th October 1879," The
Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 1, Chapter IV.
27. ^ "To
P. G. Hamerton, Kinnaird Cottage, Pitlochry [July 1881]," The Letters
of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 1, Chapter V.
28. ^ "To
Sidney Colvin, Pitlochry, August 1881," The Letters of Robert Louis
Stevenson, Volume 1, Chapter V.
29. ^ References
to Skerryvore come from Leon Edel's Henry James: A Life, c. 1985, p. 309
- 310.
30. ^ "To
W.E. Henley, Pitlochry, if you please, [August] 1881," The Letters of
Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 1, Chapter V.
31. ^ Quoted
from Stevenson's diary in Overton, Jacqueline M. The
Life of Robert Louis Stevenson for Boys and Girls. New York: Charles
Scribner's Sons, 1933.
32. ^ The
Cruise of the Janet Nichol Among the South Sea Islands, Mrs Robert Louis
Stevenson, Charles Scribner's Sons, New York, 1914.
33. ^ Letter to Sidney
Colvin, April 17, 1893, Vailima Letters, Chapter XXVIII.
34. ^ Letter to
Sidney Colvin, January 3, 1892, Vailima Letters, Chapter XIV.
35. ^ "Robert
Louis Stevenson - Bibliography: Detailed list of works". Retrieved on 2008-04-20.
36. ^ Letter to
Sidney Colvin, December 1893, Vailima Letters, Chapter XXXV.
37. ^ "To
W.E. Henley, [Trinity College, Cambridge, Autumn 1878]," The Letters of
Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 1, Chapter
III.
38. ^ Letter to
Sidney Colvin, May, 1892, Vailima Letters, Chapter XVIII.
39. ^ "To
H. B. Baildon, Vailima, Upolu [undated, but written in 1891].," The
Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 2, Chapter XI.
40. ^ Balfour,
Graham (1906). The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson. London: Methuen. 264.
http://ia350627.us.archive.org/0/items/lifeofrobertloui00balfiala/lifeofrobertloui00balfiala_djvu.txt
41. ^ "Stevenson's
tomb". National Library of Scotland. Retrieved on 2008-10-20.
Retrieved from Wikipedia,
The Free Encyclopedia. Last modified on 28 Oct 2008,
12:57.
© http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Robert_Louis_Stevenson&oldid=248183320.
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