Robert Louis Stevenson

Robert Louis Stevenson was born in Edinburgh on 13 November 1850 and died on 3 December 1894. He came from a family of lighthouse engineers and began studying engineering and then law, but he cared far more about writing. Poor health, often lung trouble, sent him in search of milder climates in France, Switzerland, the United States and eventually the South Pacific.

He wrote travel books, essays, poems and stories, and became widely loved for adventure novels such as Treasure Island and Kidnapped, and for the dark tale of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. His prose is clear, lively and full of movement, and his best books work equally well for young readers and adults. He spent his last years in Samoa, where he died. His work still shapes how we imagine pirates, Scottish history and the divided self.