Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in
Palgrave Macmillan
Book cover

Robert Louis Stevenson

A Literary Life

  • Book
  • © 2004

Overview

Authors:
  1. William Gray
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Part of the book series: Literary Lives (LL)

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this book

Log in via an institution
eBook USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access

Licence this eBook for your library

Institutional subscriptions

Table of contents (6 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xvi
    Download chapter PDF

  2. The English Scene

    • William Gray
    Pages 1-22

  3. The French Connection

    • William Gray
    Pages 23-48

  4. Forever Scotland

    • William Gray
    Pages 49-75

  5. America

    • William Gray
    Pages 76-109

  6. In the South Seas

    • William Gray
    Pages 110-161

  7. Conclusion

    • William Gray
    Pages 162-170

  8. Back Matter

    Pages 171-190
    Download chapter PDF
Back to top

Keywords

About this book

More than most writers, Robert Louis Stevenson requires a Literary Life. Fascination with Stevenson's life (the 'Stevenson biography' is almost a minor genre) has tended to eclipse his literary achievement. This study focuses on Stevenson's writing practice within the different geographical, cultural and political contexts that shaped it, from Scotland to the South Seas. Following Stevenson's own views on biography, the book is not structured primarily in terms of chronology, but is more a kind of literary geography than traditional literary history.

Reviews

'A new book... mapping the bohemian life of Robert Louis Stevenson looks at the cocaine-fuelled convalescence that produced Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and a whole lot more besides.' - Phil Hewitt - Chichester Observer

'Gray's close reading is meticulous and intelligent so there's a sense that we're engaging with the real texture of Stevenson's life and work.' - The Scotsman

'With admirable economy, Gray delineates Stevenson's engagements with different literary cultures and traditions - he is especially good on the fertilizing effects of French literature on Stevenson's imagination - and then lays out the varied fruits of those engagements: essays, poems, letters, travelogues, plays, and prose fiction' - Stephen Arata, Victorian Studies 48 (Spring 2006)

About the author

WILLIAM GRAY is Professor of Literary History and Hermeneutics at the University of Chichester, UK. He studied literature, philosophy and theology at the Universities of Oxford, Edinburgh and Princeton, and has published widely in these areas, including Death and Fantasy and books on C.S. Lewis and Robert Louis Stevenson.

Bibliographic Information

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Back to top

Search

Navigation