1850–1894 · Scottish novelist, essayist, travel writer and poet
Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, essayist, travel writer and poet, best known for Treasure Island, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Kidnapped and A Child’s Garden of Verses. In August 1879 he sailed for California to reunite with Fanny Osbourne, travelling second class on the steamship Devonia and then overland by train — a journey that nearly broke his health and produced The Amateur Emigrant. He died in 1894, and the book appeared in full the following year.