LECTURE - Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson (RLS) was born in 1850 and sadly was a very sick child (tuberculosis and often bedridden), passing away at 44 but not before creating some wonderful books for us as his legacy. It was expected that he would follow in the family business in Scottland and be a lighthouse designer (his grandfather is responsible for building over 30 of them) but instead he decided to be an engineer and then to study law and then quickly gave that up to be a writer.

He became a big traveler and wanderlust, and his travel log was his first book, “An Inland Voyage” about Belgium. His next book, “The Silverado Squatters” is about his travels in the US, where he was looking for a place he could live and breathe. As a writer with nothing he was not a “great catch” for a wife, but Fanny left her husband to be with him and travel to exotic places. In search of a better place, he bought a yacht and traveled around the world.

He travelled from Edinburgh to France to NY (Saranac Lake until winter came) and sailed from California to the South Pacific and eventually to Samoa looking for a place that would be most suitable to his health condition.

He fell in love with Samoa after only being there 3 days. After his father died, he inherited some money and he purchased over 300 acres of land and built Villa Vailima, the only 2 -story mansion in Samoa. While it was being built, he continued to travel in his yacht. His home once completed became a social and cultural center and a place to host dignitaries. He lived there with his wife Fanny, his mother, and his 2 stepchildren, managing a large staff.. He wrote some classics, many while in Samoa a time he was most prolific including: Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. He was taking cocaine for his pain during this time, and his father had just passed away when he wrote Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde after characters he knew or heard of with dual lives. Treasure Island’s description of pirates has become the defacto “look” for what we think of as pirates.

He was often bed-ritten and spent his early mornings from 6-10am writing religiously and then riding horses and spending time with the local people, who mostly thought he had no job. He spent his final years (1889-94) in Samoa, where he was revered by locals and was an advocate for their political rights and loved his life there. Samoans were losing their identity (which is part of why half of it became American Samoa) and they revered him for helping protect them and their culture. His staff and other Samoans loved RLS giving him the name Tusitala, meaning "Teller of Tales”.

When he died they buried him the way he detailed, in a letter, at a top of a hill near his home. The poem he wrote for his death was on his grave. After his was gone Fanny went to California where she lived until she passed away and was brought back to Samoa. His residence became the residence of a German Governors and eventually became a museum (see posting of our visit there in a few days).

While in Samoa he wrote over 700,000 words and many of his most popular books. It was a great place for him for many reasons and although somewhat isolated, it was a big shipping port, so he got mail there and other items- he was able to communicate with the outside world with newspapers and other people. RLS was a fascinating character and life.

The Requiem poem written by RLS for his own death, is engraved on his grave at the summit of Mount Vaea in Samoa (see posting of our visit and how it ended):

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 sea,
And the hunter home from the hill.Baca selengkapnya