BY THE SAME AUTHOR

THE MERRY HEART
THE YOUNG IDEA
THE CASEMENT
THE HAPPY FAMILY
ON THE STAIRCASE
GEORGE GISSING:
A CRITICAL STUDY

The Sargent portrait of Stevenson which forms the frontispiece to this volume has been included by permission of Mr. Lloyd Osbourne, to whom the publisher wishes to express his acknowledgments and thanks.

TO
DOUGLAS GRAY
IN MALICE

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE
I. BIOGRAPHICAL[ 9]
II. JUVENILIA[ 36]
III. TRAVEL BOOKS[ 42]
IV. ESSAYS[ 62]
V. POEMS[ 90]
VI. PLAYS[ 102]
VII. SHORT STORIES[ 116]
VIII. NOVELS AND ROMANCES[ 143]
IX. CONCLUSION[ 185]
BIBLIOGRAPHY[ 211]

I
BIOGRAPHICAL

I

As the purpose of this book is entirely critical, and as there already exist several works dealing extensively with the life of Stevenson, the present biographical section is intentionally summary. Its object is merely to sketch in outline the principal events of Stevenson’s life, in order that what follows may require no passages of biographical elucidation. Stevenson was a writer of many sorts of stories, essays, poems; and in all this diversity he was at no time preoccupied with one particular form of art. In considering each form separately, as I purpose doing, it has been necessary to group into single divisions work written at greatly different times and in greatly differing conditions. In Mr. Graham Balfour’s “Life,” and very remarkably in Sir Sidney Colvin’s able commentaries upon Stevenson’s letters, may be found information at first hand which I could only give by acts of piracy. To those works, therefore, I refer the reader who wishes to follow in chronological detail the growth of Stevenson’s talent. They are, indeed, essential to all who are primarily interested in Stevenson the man. Here, the attempt will be made only to summarise the events of his days, and to estimate the ultimate value of his work in various departments of letters. This book is not a biography; it is not an “appreciation”; it is simply a critical study.

II