Existing comment:
Where did Robert Louis Stevenson come up with the ideas for "Treasure Island"?
Thanks to Robert Louis Stevenson's numerous letters and essays, we know a great deal about his literary inspirations. The catalyst for Stevenson's "Treasure Island," the most famous of all pirate stories, was a treasure map, but his other sources were numerous and varied.
Stevenson drew from memories of works by Daniel Defoe, Edgar Allan Poe, and Washington Irving, and claimed that the novel "At Last" by Charles Kingsley was a key inspiration. Stevenson's father came up with the contents of Billy Bone's sea-chest and suggested the scene where Jim Hawkins hides in the apple barrel, and his stepson Lloyd Osbourne insisted there be no women in the story.
Writer and editor William Henley modeled the character of Long John Silver. Lloyd Osbourne described Henley as "... a great, glowing, massive-shouldered fellow with a big red beard and a crutch; jovial, astoundingly clever, and with a laugh that rolled like music he had an unimaginable fire and vitality he swept one off one's feet." In a letter to Henley after the publication of "Treasure Island," Stevenson wrote, "I will now make a confession. It was the sign of your maimed strength and masterfulness that begot Long John Silver... the idea of the maimed man, ruling and dreaded by the sound [speech], was entirely taken from you." |