Overview
This selection of Robert Louis Stevenson’s essays reveals the writer behind the adventure novels. Stevenson writes about books, travel, youth, writing, art, memory, character, and the habits that make up an ordinary life.
This title is catalogued in Essays & Literary Criticism. Its reading profile is Medium and Moderate, with themes including ideas, self development, literature, adventure, emotion.
One-Page Summary
This selection of Robert Louis Stevenson’s essays reveals the writer behind the adventure novels. Stevenson writes about books, travel, youth, writing, art, memory, character, and the habits that make up an ordinary life. His essays are unusually personal without becoming shapeless. A discussion of reading can turn into a meditation on friendship; a travel experience can become an argument about how to pay attention; a literary question can become a question about how a person should live. Stevenson’s central concern is experience. He is interested in the quality of a life, not merely its achievements.
That makes the essays a useful companion to his fiction. The same imagination that creates Treasure Island or Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde appears in nonfiction, but now it is directed toward real people and real habits. The essays also show his awareness of mortality and limited time. Reading, walking, writing, travelling, and friendship matter because life is finite.
Key Themes
Ideas: This title is tagged with ideas as one of its main themes.
Self development: This title is tagged with self development as one of its main themes.
Literature: This title is tagged with literature as one of its main themes.
Adventure: This title is tagged with adventure as one of its main themes.
Emotion: This title is tagged with emotion as one of its main themes.