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RLS and SLC: April 1888, New York City
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Samoa Scenes
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From Graham Balfour's two volume biography of Robert Louis Stevenson, published in New York by Charles Scribner's Sons, 1912.
Though a published author with a respectable reputation, RLS knew when people asked him about his "first book," they referred to Treasure Island. Originally titled "The Sea Cook," Treasure Island began with a map, drawn at the request of his step-son, Lloyd Osbourne, to "write something interesting." When the book went to the publisher, the map accompanied the manuscript, but was lost. RLS set himself the task to recreate it, though it was a difficult job. Maps make good company with many works of fiction, whether Gulliver's Travels or Moby Dick. When will a map of Dublin be a regular feature in an edition of Ulysses? For those entertaining the thought of reading Kidnapped, here's a map for you.
 Bell Rock lighthouse
“I’ve been reading Treasure Island—finished it yesterday. It is the very most enlivening, inspiring tale I’ve ever read. The feeling all through is so nice and fresh. All the descriptions are so vigorous and Stevenson seems to be in his enthusiastic youthful attitude again. I’m more and more convinced that good writing depends on simple, sensitive depiction of the small things of life with an attitude on the part of the writer which never changes unless it changes unconsciously. All the sort of thing in Treasure Island is so much to my taste, the “shadows of the pines falling in patterns across the deck,” the trees in shore, ne being a “giant of a vegetable,” and the wreck with its dripping webs of seaweed and all the water descriptions . . .”
Marianne Moore, Letters (17 March 1907) 
Bell Rock lighthouse, Granger
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Future Mrs RLS, Fanny Osbourne circa 1870.
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RLS
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RLS
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Robert Louis Stevenson
13 November 1850 - 3 November 1894
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Walter, Watty, Woggy, Woggs, Wogg, and lastly Bogue.
