The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. 25 — Reading Notes

Political Pressures and Personal Peril

Stevenson's Samoan letters are marked by a recurring sense of political vulnerability. Writing to Colvin, he notes that newspapers were 'clamouring for my incarceration' and that the German Consul had read a review of his Samoa book and considered it an insult. The threat of arrest is immediate: 'if it comes off, I shall be sent away in the Ringarooma instead of the Curaçoa.' He speculates that 'if that issue prove to be a German protectorate, I shall have to tramp.' These passages reveal a writer whose literary work had direct political consequences, forcing him to consider exile even as he built a permanent home. The letters also show his reliance on naval friendships—the Curaçoa's officers are frequent correspondents and visitors, and he hopes for their return as a form of protection.

Domestic Life and Colonial Labor

Amid political uncertainty, Stevenson's letters dwell on the material realities of building a household in Samoa. He describes the construction of his new house with a characteristic blend of humor and scale: 'a hundred black boys and about a score draught oxen perished, or at least barely escaped with their lives, from the mud holes on our road, bringing up the materials.' The birthday feast is another set piece: 'two huge sows—O, brutes of animals that would have broken down a hansom cab—four smaller pigs, two barrels of beef, and a horror of vegetables and fowls.' The gathering of 'between forty and fifty' people in a native house, followed by a siva dance, shows Stevenson participating in local customs while maintaining a European social circle. He jokes that the new room will be 'big enough to dance in,' hoping to host the Curaçoa officers.

Literary Work and the Genesis of <em>Weir of Hermiston</em>

Stevenson's letters also offer glimpses of his literary projects. In a December 1892 letter to Charles Baxter, he mentions a novel on the stocks called The Justice-Clerk, noting it is 'pretty Scotch' and that 'the Grand Premier is taken from Braxfield.' He asks Baxter to send Cockburn's Memorials, a source for the historical figure. This is the earliest reference in the volume to what would become Weir of Hermiston, left unfinished at his death. The editor's note explains that the extract 'gives a hint of Stevenson’s intended management of one of the most difficult points in the plot.' The letters thus provide a rare window into Stevenson's creative process during his final years, showing how he drew on Scottish history while living in the South Pacific.

Readers approaching this volume should attend to the interplay between Stevenson's public and private voices. The letters are not merely biographical documents; they are crafted performances, full of self-deprecating humor and strategic politicking. Colvin's editorial hand is light but present, and Lang's prefatory note sets a tone of admiration. For those interested in Stevenson's later style, these letters offer a direct line to the man who wrote A Footnote to History and was planning Weir of Hermiston—a writer caught between two worlds.

Reading Stevenson’s late letters from Samoa, I remembered my own grandfather’s fading handwriting from his last years abroad—the way he’d describe weather and politics with the same quiet urgency. That same ache of distance and duty surfaced in Letters of Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy from 1833 to 1847 — Key Ideas to Explore, where every phrase about a concert tour feels like a small farewell to somewhere he’d never return. Letters keep people whole, even when they’re gone.