अनुक्रम (Contents)

R. L. Stevenson

Life and Works

Robert Louis Stevenson was born in Edinburgh on November 13, 1850. His pedigree was honourable. The Stevenson family were brilliant engineers with an international reputation. His Board of Northern Lights, had built the Bell Rock Light-house. His father, Thomas Stevenson, had constructed most of the lighthouses on the Western coast and islands of Scotland. They were both architects and builders. Thomas Stevenson, especially, was a man of inventive genius. He made many improvements to the apparatus used in lighthouses and perfected the machinery for revolving lights. He was deeply romantic and took particular care of the self education of his only son Louis. Louis’ mother was the daughter of Dr. Lewis Balfoure, parish minister of Colinton. Mrs. Stevenson was delicate and Louis Stevenson inherited his chest troubles from her. As a child he passed from one illness to another. The family house was in Edinburgh, but repeated changes for the mother’s health or the boy’s, interrupted his schooling, so that Louis grew up mainly in the company of his father, his mother and a devoted nurse Alison Cunningham. His mother and his nurse read to him perpetually, since he could not be outdoors playing, and it was the nurse who affected his mind with her own delight in words. She used to read him works of others, gloating on the rhythm, dwelling with delight on the assonances and alliterations, and the boy learnt the art of decking words in his writings.

Louis Stevenson was a precocious child and even at the age of six he showed the promise of his future years. At six years of age he dedicated to his mother a history of Moses for a prize offered by an uncle. He went to school in 1859, but ill health rendered his attendance irregular. At school his bent of mind was displayed by his staring several manuscipt, magazines, and before he was fifteen he had written several stories. In 1867 he went to Edinburgh University, which he left without taking a degree, and where his time was largely spent in a highly rational system of truantery’. His father intended him for the engineering profession but when he was twenty Louis broke it to his father that he did not mean to be an engineer but wished to earn his living as a writer. His father reluctantly accepted his refusal but insisted that he should read law if he should not go on with engineering. He read for the Scots bar, to which he was called in July 1875 but he proved an uttar failure. At this time of his life he started living a vagabond life and began to move in low company. In the underworld of Edingburgh he fell in love with a girl and intended to marry her, but he had no money and the marriage did not materialise. Then he came in contact with Mrs. Sitwell and Sidney Colvin, his life-long friends, and they arranged for his travels between 1873 to 1879. For some time he lived in the South of France. There he met an American lady and fell in love with her. His father objected to his proposed marriage but he was resolute and on August 7, 1879 he sailed to New York. On May 19, 1880 he married Fanny Van de Grift, in California. From this point Stevenson’s literary career may be said properly to have begun. After a stay at Calistoga he returned to England. Meanwhile though very ill with tuberculosis, he contributed to various periodicals and wrote a number of essays, poems, short stories, novels. letters, fragments of travel and autobiography. In 1888 Stevenson had set out for the South seas and settled in Samoa, where he died suddenly from rapture of a blood vessel in the brain. He was buried in Samao. He died on December 3, 1894.

रॉबर्ट लुई स्टीवेन्सन : जीवन-परिचय तथा कृतियाँ

जीवन-परिचय-रॉबर्ट लुई स्टीवेन्सन का जन्म एडिनबर्ग (Edinburgh) में 13 नवम्बर, 1850 को हुआ था। उसके पिता का नाम थॉमस स्टीवेन्सन था। उसके पिता एक इंजीनियर थे, उनकी अन्तर्राष्ट्रीय ख्याति थी। Board of Northern Lights ने Bell Rock Light-house बनाया था। उसके पिता ने Western Coast और स्कॉटलैण्ड के द्वीपों में Light-houses बनाये थे। वे architects और builders थे। उनके पिता inventive genius थे। उन्होंने Light-houses में प्रयोग होने वाले apparatus तथा मशीनरी में सुधार किया। उन्होंने अपने पुत्र की शिक्षा पर विशेष ध्यान दिया। लुई की माता Dr. Lewis Balfoure की पुत्री थीं जो Colinton के Parish minister थे। उनकी माता सदा बीमार रहती थीं। बचपन में लुई को भी कई बीमारियों का सामना करना पड़ा। उनका परिवार एडिनबर्ग में था। लुई अपने पिता के साथ अक्सर रहता था। उसके साथ वफादार Nurse Alison Cunnigham रहती थी। नर्स और उसकी माता ने लुई को पढ़ाया। वह बाहर खेलने भी नहीं जा सकता था। नर्स का उस पर बहुत प्रभाव पड़ा। वह अन्य लेखकों की पुस्तकों को पढ़ाती थी।

प्रारम्भिक शिक्षा-लुई ने छः वर्ष की आयु में ही भविष्य की झाँकी प्रस्तुत की। उसने छः वर्ष की आयु में चाचा से इनाम प्राप्त कर History of Moses बताई। वह 1859 ई. में स्कूल में पढ़ने गया परन्तु बुरे स्वास्थ्य के कारण नियमित रूप से अध्ययन नहीं कर सका। उसके स्कूली जीवन में कई मैगजीन, Manuscript पढ़े। पन्द्रह वर्ष की आयु तक उसने कई कहानियाँ लिखीं। प्रारम्भिक स्कूली शिक्षा के बाद उसने 1867 में Edinburgh की यूनीवर्सिटी में प्रवेश लिया। उसे विज्ञान और इंजीनियरिंग में कोई रुचि न थी। बीमारी के कारण उसने यूनीवर्सिटी 1871 ई. में छोड़ दी और L-L.B. कक्षा में प्रवेश लिया। वह 1875 ई. में एडवोकेट बन गया। इस समय वह निम्न श्रेणी की कम्पनी में हो गया। वह एक लड़की से प्रेम करने लगा और उससे विवाह करना चाहता था परन्तु उसके पास धन न था अत: विवाह न हो सका। तब वह Mrs. Sitwell और Sidney Colvin के सम्पर्क में आया जो उसके काफी लम्बे समय तक जीवन में सम्पर्क में रहे। उन्होंने 1873 से 1879 ई. तक की यात्राओं का प्रबन्ध किया। कुछ समय तक वह फ्रांस के दक्षिण में रहा। वहाँ वह एक अमेरिकन महिला से मिला और उसके प्रेम में लिप्त हो गया। उसके पिता ने प्रस्तावित विवाह का विरोध किया परन्तु वह दृढ़ निश्चय कर चुका था। वह 7 अगस्त, 1879 को न्यूयार्क को रवाना हो गया। 19 मई, 1880 को उसने कैलीफोर्निया में Fanny Van de Grift से विवाह कर लिया। इसके बाद उसका साहित्यिक जीवन प्रारम्भ हो गया। Calistoga में ठहरने के बाद वह इंग्लैण्ड लौट आया। इस बीच बीमार होते हुए भी उसने कई Periodicals का सम्पादन किया। टी. बी. का मरीज होते हुए भी उसने अनेक निबन्ध, कविताएँ, उपन्यास, पत्र, यात्रा-कथाएँ और आत्मकथा लिखी। 1888 ई. में स्टीवेन्सन ने दक्षिण की समुद्री यात्रा की और तब Samoa में बस गया। उसकी वहाँ मृत्यु हो गई। उसकी मृत्यु 3 दिसम्बर, 1894 को हुई। वह दो अधूरे उपन्यास छोड़कर स्वर्गवासी हुआ।

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