The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. 24
The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. 24
Stevenson at his most vulnerable and honest. This volume of letters captures the celebrated author in pursuit of one thing: a climate kind enough to keep him alive. Recently returned from California, his tubercular lungs drive him southward to the Mediterranean, where he settles in a modest house in St. Marcel, near Marseilles. The letters document his restlessness, his frustration with the invalid's life, and his determined search for both physical healing and creative renewal. Yet illness is only part of the story. These pages reveal Stevenson as correspondent, companion, and observer: playful with friends, tender with family, sharp-eyed about the world passing around his sickbed. An epidemic disrupts his plans. Correspondence with his wife Fanny and other loved ones carries both banter and genuine longing. What emerges is an intimate portrait beyond the public author, where literary ambition intertwines with the daily fight to breathe. For anyone who has ever wanted to hear Stevenson speak in his own voice, unfiltered and unguarded, these letters offer exactly that.
