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Viewing: Blog Posts Tagged with: robert louis stevenson, Most Recent at Top [Help]
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1. 5 Edinburgh attractions for booklovers [slideshow]

The Edinburgh Fringe is in full swing with over 3,000 arts events coming to the vibrant Scottish capital over the next few weeks. With the International Book Festival kicking off on the 13th, we’ve compiled our favourite bookish spots around the city for you to squeeze into your schedule.

The post 5 Edinburgh attractions for booklovers [slideshow] appeared first on OUPblog.

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2. Fast Reads: INFOGRAPHIC

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3. Up in the air I go flying again

 

 

Screenshot 2015-08-04 16.51.57

Writing so much about my early life recently has brought back a slew of memories, and with them some of the first poems I memorized at school. I taught this one, by Jessica Nelson North, to Autumn when she was a girl, and she loved it.

 

Three Guests

 

I had a little tea party
This afternoon at three.
‘Twas very small—
Three guests in all—
Just I, myself and me.

 

Myself ate all the sandwiches,
While I drank up the tea;
‘Twas also I who ate the pie
And passed the cake to me.

I haven’t thought much about the other that’s been knocking around in my head — Robert Louis Stevenson’s “The Swing” — since I learned it way back when. Now I can’t wait to teach them to my niece (three) and nephews (both four) the next time I visit.

Also, to try to describe a swing with a view of “Rivers and trees and cattle and all / Over the countryside” — an exotic thing to imagine even when I was young.

 

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4. Embark on six classic literary adventures

Despite fierce winds, piles of snow, and the biting cold, winter is the best season for some cozy reading (and drinking hot chocolate). If you’re inclined to stay in today, check out these favorite classics of ours that will take you on wild adventures, all while huddled underneath your sheets.

Jules Verne’s The Extraordinary Journeys: Around the World in Eighty Days

What starts out as a bet to settle an argument between club members transforms into a grand adventure. It is fascinating, fast-paced, and enchanting, and brings you around the world in just eighty days!

Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra’s Don Quixote de la Mancha

In following the journey of Alonso Quixano, we find ourselves both amused and sad at the protagonist’s delusion of the world around him. The satirical elements of Don Quixote have permeated our modern literary culture and vocabulary: the term “quixotic” describes one who is too idealistic.

Alexandre Dumas’s The Count of Monte Cristo

Jealousy, revenge, romance, hope, and justice flavor this jam-packed classic. After being thrown into jail for accused treason, Edmond Dantès only escapes after his fellow prisoner discloses the location of a vast wealth on the island of Monte Cristo. Once Dantès retrieves the hidden treasure, he poses as the Count of Monte Cristo and thus begins his plot of revenge against the men who put him away.

Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels

From the land of people no larger than six inches tall, to the land of horse people called Houyhnhnms, Lemuel Gulliver finds himself in lands like no other. His travels are sparked by (what we assume to be) a mid-life crisis, when his business fails. In a number of expeditions, Gulliver takes to the seas in a wanderlust sort of way, visiting his wife and children in between travels.

Image by Igor Ilyinsky. CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.
Image by Igor Ilyinsky. CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island

In this six-part adventure, Jim Hawkins narrates his journey from the death of a patron at his family’s inn — leaving behind a map and other clues pointing to buried treasure — to encounters with pirates on the high seas. Treasure Island captivates with its simple, yet lively prose. It’s a coming-of-age story for anyone at any age.

Alexandre Dumas’s The Three Musketeers

Athos, Porthos, and Aramis—the three musketeers—join up with a young noble named d’Artagnan, who seems to find trouble for himself. In this riveting tale full of assassination attempts, a scandalous love affair, and revenge, there is also fierce loyalty, camaraderie, and energy among the four musketeers.

Headline image credit: Irving Johnson. Original photo courtesy of Glenn Batuyong, Port of San Diego. CC BY 2.0 via Flickr.

The post Embark on six classic literary adventures appeared first on OUPblog.

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5. ALMOST AT SEA: Penny Dolan




My local writer’s group holds a recitation evening at this time of year, when people seem drawn to old stories and songs and poems. The poem below, although not traditionally wintry, is my own favourite for this season. 

Almost a short story, the poem was written by Robert Louis Stevenson, who was the son of a lighthouse engineer, and appeared in 1888 after the publication of his Treasure Island.  Although the poem seems to be about danger at sea, the emotional conflict and longing seem to me a deeper part of the celebration itself, whether on land or sea. Please, if you have a moment, do read through to the end.

 Christmas at Sea

The sheets were frozen hard, and they cut the naked hand;
The decks were like a slide, where a seaman scarce could stand;
The wind was a nor'wester, blowing squally off the sea;
And cliffs and spouting breakers were the only things a-lee.


They heard the surf a-roaring before the break of day;
But 'twas only with the peep of light we saw how ill we lay.
We tumbled every hand on deck instanter, with a shout,
And we gave her the maintops'l, and stood by to go about.


All day we tacked and tacked between the South Head and the North;
All day we hauled the frozen sheets, and got no further forth;
All day as cold as charity, in bitter pain and dread,
For very life and nature we tacked from head to head.


We gave the South a wider berth, for there the tide race roared;
But every tack we made we brought the North Head close aboard:
So's we saw the cliffs and houses, and the breakers running high,
And the coastguard in his garden, with his glass against his eye.


The frost was on the village roofs as white as ocean foam;
The good red fires were burning bright in every 'long-shore home;
The windows sparkled clear, and the chimneys volleyed out;
And I vow we sniffed the victuals as the vessel went about.


The bells upon the church were rung with a mighty jovial cheer;
For it's just that I should tell you how (of all days in the year)
This day of our adversity was blessèd Christmas morn,
And the house above the coastguard's was the house where I was born.


O well I saw the pleasant room, the pleasant faces there,
My mother's silver spectacles, my father's silver hair;
And well I saw the firelight, like a flight of homely elves,
Go dancing round the china plates that stand upon the shelves.


And well I knew the talk they had, the talk that was of me,
Of the shadow on the household and the son that went to sea;
And O the wicked fool I seemed, in every kind of way,
To be here and hauling frozen ropes on blessèd Christmas Day.


They lit the high sea-light, and the dark began to fall.
'All hands to loose top gallant sails,' I heard the captain call.
'By the Lord, she'll never stand it,' our first mate, Jackson, cried.
… 'It's the one way or the other, Mr. Jackson,' he replied.


She staggered to her bearings, but the sails were new and good,
And the ship smelt up to windward just as though she understood.
As the winter's day was ending, in the entry of the night,
We cleared the weary headland, and passed below the light.


And they heaved a mighty breath, every soul on board but me,
As they saw her nose again pointing handsome out to sea;
But all that I could think of, in the darkness and the cold,
Was just that I was leaving home and my folks were growing old.


 * * * * *



The Awfully Big Blog posts are mostly about fiction, but there are poetry readers and writers too. 

What’s the title - and author - of your favourite poem at this time of year?

Penny Dolan

(The painting is by Aivasovsky Ivan Constantinovitch. 1899.)

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6. Josh Weil: The Powells.com Interview

Dima and Yarik are twin brothers in a Russia set in a slightly alternate universe, in the city of Petroplavilsk. The city is in perpetual daylight, thanks to the Oranzheria — a "sea of glass" greenhouse built over farmlands lit by mirrors in space. Though inseparable in childhood, Dima and Yarik begin to take radically [...]

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7. How To Write About Nature

Can you name all the trees, flowers and birds around you? According to legend, the great novelist Vladimir Nabokov once met a Cornell University who asked Nabokov for writing advice. The writing student received this curt reply:

Nabokov looks up from his reading he points to a tree outside his office window. ‘What kind of tree is that?’ he asks the student. ‘What?’ ‘What is the name of that tree?’ asks Nabokov. ‘The one outside my window.’ ‘I don’t know,’says the student. ‘You’ll never be a writer.’ says Nabokov.”

Debut novelist Brian Kimberling published Snapper this week, a novel drawn from his own experience as  a bird researcher. His book is filled with careful and unexpected descriptions of nature, so we caught up with Kimberling for some nature writing advice…

continued…

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8. Free eBooks for Halloween

To celebrate Halloween and All Hallow’s Read, we’ve rounded up 25 free horror books that you can download right now for your eReader, smartphone or tablet. Follow the links below to read…

In 2010, novelist Neil Gaiman created the “All Hallow’s Read,” literary holiday, a night to give someone you love a scary book. The writer explained the new tradition in the video embedded above–here’s more from the official site:

Obviously, we support bookshops and authors, but more than that, this is about making a holiday tradition of book-giving. So feel free to give second-hand books or books from your own shelves. And feel just as free to buy a beautiful new book from a small independent bookseller, or from online or… look, there’s no wrong way to buy a book. You can even gift it to their Kindle … If you do not know what scary book to give someone, talk to a bookseller or a librarian. They like to help. Librarians will not mind even if you admit that you are not planning to take out a book, but instead you are going to buy one and give it to someone.

continued…

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9. Dorchester Publishing Trying To Transfer Rights Back to Authors

Dorchester Publishing closed earlier this year and sold 1,000 titles to Amazon. Now the publisher is working to transfer rights back to its authors, but they have a long list of writers that they cannot contact.

Click here to see the list of authors Dorchester hopes to contact. If you know any of these authors, help them connect with Dorchester and complete the revision process. Oddly enough, the list includes a few authors who have passed away, including Louis L’AmourRobert Louis Stevenson and H.P. Lovecraft.

Check it out: “Thank you for your support over the last 75 years. At this time, we are completing the reversion process, transferring all titles back to their respective authors. Though we have made great strides, our research has uncovered a number of authors for whom we have no contact information. In addition, there are a number of titles without corresponding authors. To complete this reversion process, we will need your help.” (Via Stacia Kane & Sarah Weinman)

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10. Review of the Day: The Swing by Robert Louis Stevenson

The Swing
By Robert Louis Stevenson
Illustrated By Julie Morstad
Simply Read Books
$8.95
ISBN: 978-1897476482
Ages 0-3
On shelves August 15th

There comes a moment in a new parent’s life when they realize that they have become their own parents. It’s different for everyone. For some folks it won’t happen until they’re berating their teenagers, conjuring up terms and threats from their own youth that they swore they’d never use. For others, it happens at practically the moment after conception. And for me, it happened when I read my one-year-old daughter Julie Morstad’s simply irresistible adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic poem The Swing. As I read the book aloud I realized that I had heard this poem myself as a child. I could even recall the images that accompanied it, filled with sickly sweet children with cheeks so large they’d make the Campbell Soup kids seem wan in comparison. And when later I heard my own mother recite this poem I was amazed to discover that my reading, which I’d done several time for my own daughter, contained the exact same cadences and turns of phrase as my mother’s rendition. The difference for my daughter will be the fact that while the art accompanying my The Swing was tepid, the images that appear in Julie Morstad’s gorgeous little board book are utterly lovely creations. For all those parents desperate to introduce their toddlers to poetry, or just folks who want to read their kids something beautiful for once, here is the answer to your prayers.

“How do you like to go up in a swing / Up in the air so blue?” I should think you’d like it very much if you were one of the children in Julie Morstad’s clever little book. Adapting Robert Louis Stevenson’s words, Ms. Morstad fills her pages with kids on their way up, their way down, and everywhere in-between. They glide under cherry blossoms, observe the even rows of plants and vegetables, and swing like superheroes on their bellies. The result is a haunting but thoroughly enjoyable update to a poem that feels as fresh and fun as it was the day it was first published in the late 1800s.

Etsy has been a simultaneous boon and problem for the children’s picture book world. On the one hand, there is no better place for editors to find up and coming artists. Never before has a public forum of this scope yielded such rich artistic talent. On the other hand, there is a kind of Etsy “look” that typifies the people found there. It’s what allows reviewers like myself to view certain kinds of children’s books and sniff “Etsy” when we want to put them down. Now at a first glance Morstad’s work on The Swing might strike you as falling in the Etsy vein. An unfair assumption since as far as I can tell Ms. Morstad sells her art herself and not through Etsy. More to the point, this book is better than that. Granted I wouldn’t mind taking some of the images found in the book and framing them on my wall (particularly that cover image with the black background and white haired girl swinging through a field of vibrant blossoms). But there’s a quality to Ms. Morstad’s art that feels more than merely trendy. There’s a lot of beauty here, and it

11 Comments on Review of the Day: The Swing by Robert Louis Stevenson, last added: 8/14/2012
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11. hist whist

A Child's Garden of VersesWhen the big ones were little, we got the Child’s Garden of Songs CD (like every other Charlotte Masonish homeschooler in the country), and oh how those small girls of mine adored it. For years it was their most frequently requested music, especially at bedtime–especially in summer. ;) We got the beloved Tasha Tudor-illustrated picture-book-sized edition of Child’s Garden of Verses, too, of course: another CM requisite. My girls liked the book well enough, but it was the CD they cherished, and it’s the CD they still recall with affection, and hum around the house from time to time. Those lovely Celtic-flavored melodies got into my blood, too; that’s the kind of music I love best; it stirs my heart, gives me the shivers.

Now and then I’ll realize suddenly that there are these books and songs that meant the world to us ten, twelve years ago (Amazon informs me I purchased the Tasha Tudor book on April 14, 2000—six years to the day before Rilla was born; gosh, even before Beanie was born; and now I’m a little whelmed by the thought that in some respects, Amazon has a better record of my family history than I do)—important to us years ago, I was saying, but my younger trio don’t know them at all. It happened with Miss Rumphius (heresy!) and it happened with Child’s Garden of Songs.

I realized this a week or two ago and tracked down the CD, and we’ve listened to it every couple of days since. Rilla and Wonderboy are as enchanted by its melodies as their big sisters were. Huck remains somewhat indifferent, but then there aren’t any songs about trucks, are there?

The large book with the Tasha Tudor illustrations has failed to jump out from any of the shelves on which I’d expect it to be residing. All I found was the little Dover paperback edition, print only, no pictures; but Rilla doesn’t care. She sprawled on my bed today, frantically hunting each of the poems during the opening measures of its corresponding song on the CD—pause, Mommy, I can’t find it! oh here it is—and then calmly, almost serenely, singing along, kicking her feet, looking up to identify various instruments in the musical arrangement. Guitar, piano, violin, a fluty thing, those little round things you wear on your fingers, more violin, maracas. It was supposed to be my quiet reading time but I gave up on my book and watched her instead. It was a fancy dress day; she likes her sash tied in a fastidious bow, but she scorns anything that binds or tames her hair. The ragged locks fell over her face as she peered down at the book. Amazon says I purchased the Garden of Songs CD on July 19, 2002. Jane was seven that June. You know, last week.

hist whistThe other book Rilla wanted today—wanted fiercely, rejecting my offer of the next Brambly Hedge story—was hist whist, the li

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12. Billy Connolly Reads ‘My Shadow’ by Robert Louis Stevenson

In honor of National Poetry Month, we’ve dug up a video featuring UK actor Billy Connolly reading Robert Louis Stevenson‘s “My Shadow.” The video features scenes from Disney’s 1953 animation film, Peter Pan.

Connolly is currently acting in Peter Jackson‘s two-part Hobbit movies; he plays a dwarf named Dáin II Ironfoot. In the past, he has starred in many literary adaptations including Gulliver’s Travels (2010) and Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004).

Stevenson wrote Treasure Island and The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde. He also published poetry, short stories and travel writing. “My Shadow” comes from a collection of children’s poetry entitled A Child’s Garden of Verses. Internet users can download that book for free on Project Gutenberg.

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13. Interview with Angelica Shirley Carpenter Biographer of Children’s Book Authors

By Nicki Richesin, The Children’s Book Review
Published: November 27, 2011

Anjelica Shirley Carpenter

Angelica Shirley Carpenter is the author of many acclaimed biographies written for young people including Frances Hodgson Burnett: Beyond the Secret Garden, L. Frank Baum: Royal Historian of Oz, Robert Louis Stevenson: Finding Treasure Island, and Lewis Carroll: Through the Looking Glass. She also edited In the Garden: Essays in Honor of Frances Hodgson Burnett. Carpenter is the founding curator of the Arne Nixon Center for the Study of Children’s Literature at California State University in Fresno.

Nicki Richesin: Thank you for agreeing to do this interview. I know our readers will be fascinated by your writing life. You have established an impressive career as a biographer of many beloved and celebrated children’s book authors including Frances Hodgson Burnett, L. Frank Baum, Robert Louis Stevenson and Lewis Carroll. How did you first begin writing your books?

Angelica Shirley Carpenter: I began about 1988 when my mother Jean Shirley retired and moved from St. Louis to live near me in Palm Springs, Florida. Mother had already published several biographies for children and she arrived in Florida with a good idea for a new one, about Frances Hodgson Burnett. Oh, and she wanted us to write this together. In St. Louis Mother had found and read The One I Knew the Best of All, Frances’ autobiography of her childhood, and she thought that it would make a good starting point. I was running a small public library at this time, and I knew that children still read and loved The Secret Garden and A Little Princess, so I agreed that Frances would make a good subject. We established that the only biography of Frances Hodgson Burnett for young people had been written by her daughter-in-law in 1965. It lacked illustrations and, worse, it omitted certain incidents that were embarrassing to Frances’ family, like her divorce and remarriage. So we decided to write a more accurate account of her life and to try to publish it with photographs and illustrations from her books.

Your mother Jean Shirley was your co-author on three of your books. Could you tell us about her influence on your life and how you collaborated together?

14. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson (Naxos Audiobooks)

This post is going to be a little different than my normal book posts because I want to share with you a wonderful company and their wonderful products. Teachers, librarians, and parents (home school parents, especially) should know about Naxos Audiobooks. If you don’t, then stay tuned. If you do already know about them, then click on over to their website now and see their new releases in October. They have audio books and supplemental materials for all ages from elementary school aged kids to adults.

This post is specifically about Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson because that is the sample Naxos provided for me to review as part of their Young Adult Classics series. We all know the story of Dr. Jekyll, who tried to live a respectable life until he became addicted to the potion that changed him into Mr. Hyde. Heck, I think even little kids know the story because isn’t there a Bugs Bunny episode where BB drinks a potion and turns into a big, green, mean, nasty rabbit? But if you are studying the classics with your children or your students OR if you have a child who is an auditory learner, then I urge you to check out this version of Stevenson’s classic.

WHY?

Well, the study guide and booklet are wonderful. See, when you order the audio CDS from Naxos for $17.98, you also receive a CD-ROM with the text for the ABRIDGED version (which is what is on the audio CD), the text for the UNABRIDGED version, and a 38-page study guide written by a wonderful educator, Francis Gilbert, who actually makes the study guide entertaining as he talks right to the youth (but teachers, you can use it too! :) ).

Here are a few excerpts from the study guide:

  • “This study guide takes a different approach from most study guides. It does not simply tell you more about the story and characters, which isn’t actually that useful. Instead it attempts to show how the author’s techniques and interests inform every single facet of this classic novel.
    Most study guides simply tell you what is going on, then tack on bits at the end which tell you how the author creates suspense and drama at certain points in the book, informing you a little about why the author might have done this. This study guide starts with the how and the why, showing you right from the start how and why the author shaped the key elements of the book.”
  • Robert Louis Stevenson was born in 1850, slap bang in the middle of the 19th century. He is a figure who straddles both the Victorian and the modern age: his writing appears Victorian on the surface, in its settings and characters, but dig deeper and you find a modern interest in the darker sides of the human mind.”

Just from these two excerpts, you can tell the study guide is not boring. It has sections on the context of the novel, themes and structure, critical perspectives, discussion questions, quotes, and a glossary. If you home school a teen, this is the perfect guide for them. If you teach middle school/high school English, this audio CD and the study guide will complement any unit on Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

BTW, you can order it as a download too, in this techy age, and currently the price for that is $12.00.

Here’s a link to the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde page on Naxos: http://www.naxosaudiobooks.com/296612.htm

IF you aren’t interested in this Young Adult Classic,

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15. Why Captain Marryat would have disapproved of Treasure Island

By Peter Hunt Captain Frederick Marryat, an experienced Naval Officer, was a pioneering writer of sea-and-island adventure stories, such as Peter Simple (1834) and Mr Midshipman Easy (1836). One day his children asked him to write a sequel to The Swiss Family Robinson, Johann Wyss’s extravagant embroidering of the Robinson Crusoe story, which had found its circuitous way into English via William Godwin’s translation of a French version in 1816. Marryat was not amused.

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16. Friday: Quotes that stick

Talking is a hydrant in the yard and writing is a faucet upstairs in the house. Opening the first takes the pressure off the second. — Robert Frost

One must be an inventor to read well. There is then creative reading as well as creative writing.  — Ralph Waldo Emerson

I make it clear why I write as I do and why other poets write as they do. After hundreds of experiments I decided to go my own way in style and see what would happen.  –Carl Sandburg

I wrote poems in my corner of the Brooks Street station. I sent them to two editors who rejected them right off. I read those letters of rejection years later and I agreed with those editors. — Carl Sandburg

 The difficulty of literature is not to write, but to write what you mean  – Robert Louis Stevenson

*all quotes courtesy of Brainyquote and thinkexist.com*


Filed under: writing for children Tagged: carl sandburg, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Robert Frost, Robert Louis Stevenson

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17. Elijah Wood to Reprise Frodo Baggins Role

Actor Elijah Wood will return to Middle Earth in the two-part film adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien‘s The Hobbit.

Deadline New York reported: “Wood is confirmed to star in Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit to be shot in New Zealand. In addition, he has signed on to play ‘Ben Gunn’ in Stewart Harcourt’s adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island along side Eddie Izzard.”

Besides Wood (pictured, via), other castmates returning from Lord of the Rings include: Cate Blanchett as Galadriel, Sir Ian McKellen as Gandalf, and Andy Serkis as Gollum. At the moment, Orlando Bloom is rumored to be considering his return as Legolas.

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18. friday feast: robert louis stevenson in hawai'i



      
      Robert Louis Stevenson at age 7.

I've been thinking how different poets speak to us at different times in our lives.

Take Robert Louis Stevenson, for example. "My Shadow," from A Child's Garden of Verses, was the first poem I truly loved. I picked it out of a library book when I was 8 or 9, and was convinced it was written just for me.  

I memorized the poem and never took my shadow for granted ever again. She was much better than an imaginary friend, but what a copycat! ☺

When I had lunch at the Wai'oli Tea Room recently, I was fascinated by a picture I saw of Stevenson with King Kalakaua (the "Merrie Monarch"). I knew that Louis, as he liked to be called, spent about three years (1888-90) sailing around the eastern and central Pacific, visiting the Marquesas,  Society Islands, Tahiti, etc., with an extended stay (5 months) in Hawai'i, before purchasing 400+ acres and building a home in Samoa (where he is buried). I wanted to know more.


RLS and his wife Fanny in the Gilbert Islands (click to enlarge).

After a little digging, I stumbled upon an online exhibit at the Edinburgh City Libraries website, featuring a scrapbook of Louis's South Sea adventures which belonged to his stepson, Lloyd Osbourne. What a treasure trove of goodies!

There are rare never-before-been-seen private photos of a relaxed Stevenson and his family, which offers a unique peek at how island life was perceived by foreign travelers during Victorian times. 


RLS with his wife (Fanny), the King, his mother (Margaret Stevenson), and Lloyd Osbourne (seated on floor), aboard the Casco, a yacht Stevenson chartered in 1888 for his South Seas voyage (click to enlarge).

Of course, I most love the photos of Louis in Hawai'i. Louis became great friends with the King; both were world travelers who enjoyed champagne and a good game of whist. Here is a poem Louis wrote for Kalakaua in February 1889:


RLS with Lloyd Osbourne and King Kalakaua in the King's Boat House (1889).
(click to enlarge)

TO KALAKAUA
(With a present of a pearl)

The Silver Ship, my King - that was her name
In the bright islands whence your fathers came -
The Silver Ship, at rest from winds and tides,
Below your palace in your harbour rides:
And the seafarers, sitting safe on shore,
Like eager merchants count their treasures o'er.
One gift they find, one strange and lovely thing,
Now doubly precious since it pleased a king.

The right, my liege, is ancient as the lyre

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19. Books at Bedtime: Three British Classics

In the next couple of months we are going to see three theatre productions all based on classic stories – The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson and A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. Being a purist in these matters, I resolved that we would have to read the books together first…

Having just read the last three chapters of Treasure Island literally today, we will be starting A Christmas Carol this week, so I’ll report back on that one. It’s a story I’ve read several times myself and we’re looking forward to sharing it with our boys; and my mother has given us the audio-book too, read by Miriam Margoyles…

The other two were unknown entities. Of course I knew of them but I’m slightly ashamed to admit that I hadn’t actually read either of these classics before… but at the same time, it’s meant that our discussions of the book have been very much from the same stand-point: what’s going to happen next? Why did they do that? Can we have just one more chapter, pleeeease?

Both books are narrated in the first person. The language at times can be challenging to a modern reader but in both instances, the plot is so exciting and the descriptions so full and vivid that it’s worth the effort. I have to say, when we started The Prisoner of Zenda, I did wonder if I’d made a mistake: the beginning seemed turgid and the wit slightly precious: but the excitement built up so quickly that in fact I was being presented with the book for a book session at all hours, not just bedtime. By having them read aloud to them, children don’t get hung up on the difficult words anyway. We’ve learnt lots about the parts of castles and ships – but that wasn’t what it was all about; that’s just a side-line. What we’ve had are two great stories. Little brother’s “Wicked!” to describe The Prisoner of Zenda might not have been fully understood by Anthony Hope, but he can take it as a complement!

These stories are perhaps not what we would term multicultural but they do all espouse a strong line on tolerance and understanding, and doing what is right. They put across notions of right and wrong without preaching and without over-simplifying any issues involved – Long John Silver and Ben Gunn of Treasure Island are complex characters; Rudolf Rassendyll, the true hero of The Prisoner of Zenda has to make some pretty tough decisions against himself in order to maintain the status quo.

We have more than enjoyed reading these books together and it is not difficult to understand how they have stood the test of time. There are classics in every culture: which classics from your culture are you reading to your children?

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20. November 13 Birthday: Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson, writer
Nov. 13, 1850-Dec. 3, 1894

Lives of the Writers: Comedies, Tragedies (and What the Neighbors Thought) by Kathleen Krull, illustrated by Kathryn Hewitt (Harcourt, 1994)

Treasure Island, Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Stevenson penned these classics and more. He suffered from tuberculosis and wrote mostly in bed. A Scot, he eventually settled in Samoa.

Want to listen to a classic read aloud? Download Treasure Island at Librivox.org, a site dedicated to promoting recordings in the Public Domain.

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