Treasure Island: Stevenson's Immersive Adventure

Based Boys Books

When searching out works best fit for a canon of Boy's Own Stories, the name Robert Louis Stevenson certainly deserves a special place. Well-loved by generations, endlessly adapted and riffed upon, Stevenson's works are among those few groundbreaking pieces that invent the conventions and tropes of an entire genre. The sea-story is a young man's staple, deservedly so, and Stevenson brought together personal influences and artistic desires to crystallize the subgenre of Pirate Yarn. Treasure Island is not only a deserved classic, it earns its space on the modern boy's shelf and stands up to repeated reading by those adults seeking the keys to the craft of boyish adventure writing. Or just seeking a good time.

The great writers of young people's literature in the heyday of the genre all kept their readers enthralled by insistently taking their audience seriously. Debates on style and substance aside, Treasure Island sets a high bar from the first few paragraphs. The young reader who first encounters Stevenson at age 10 or so will not be discouraged by needless complexity, and will probably be surprised at how easily the sentences flow despite their being littered with words they have to look up or guess at from context clues. But they will certainly notice the archaic language, and the absence of even the sort of humorous meta-text asides found in Barrie’s Peter Pan for instance. The book takes itself and its audience seriously, expecting that they are ready for tales brimful of all the world’s surprise and darkness.

While the depictions of skullduggery are relatively tame when revisited, they loom large in memory because of the fact that the novel centers on an adolescent hero who, in the course of the story, survives multiple betrayals, takes personal risks to save the lives of others, suffers wounds, and kills a man with a pistol in self-defense. The classic scene is etched tersely in our collective memory:

“One more step, Mr. Hands,” said I, “and I’ll blow your brains out! Dead men don’t bite, you know,” I added with a chuckle.

He stopped instantly. I could see by the working of his face that he was trying to think, and the process was so slow and laborious that, in my new-found security, I laughed aloud. At last, with a swallow or two, he spoke, his face still wearing the same expression of extreme perplexity. In order to speak he had to take the dagger from his mouth, but in all else he remained unmoved.

“Jim,” says he, “I reckon we’re fouled, you and me, and we’ll have to sign articles. I’d have had you but for that there lurch, but I don’t have no luck, not I; and I reckon I’ll have to strike, which comes hard, you see, for a master mariner to a ship’s younker like you, Jim.”

I was drinking in his words and smiling away, as conceited as a cock upon a wall, when, all in a breath, back went his right hand over his shoulder. Something sang like an arrow through the air; I felt a blow and then a sharp pang, and there I was pinned by the shoulder to the mast. In the horrid pain and surprise of the moment—I scarce can say it was by my own volition, and I am sure it was without a conscious aim—both my pistols went off, and both escaped out of my hands. They did not fall alone; with a choked cry, the coxswain loosed his grasp upon the shrouds and plunged head first into the water.

This is, first and foremost, a story tailor-made to teach young men the vital qualities of self-reliance, calculated risk, diligence and dutiful loyalty. Jim Hawkins threads the difficult needle of a boy's hero who is aspirational without seeming too perfect. He makes mistakes and errors of judgement, but also steps up to big moments and carries himself with pluck and courage. He has a few standout moments of quick thinking or bold speech that we wish we could emulate in times of stress. Perfect fodder for the young man in your life ready to graduate to the first years of adolescence and in need of a relatable star to chart his course. Jim protects his mother, goes on adventures, gets into and out of scrapes, and returns home wiser and wealthier, all while Stevenson luxuriates in the everyday quotidian this-ness of it all. A master of description without ever descending into needless detail or flowery language, he peppers his prose with vivid pictures that roll off the tongue and heighten the immersion of the reader.

An important component of our burgeoning Based Boys library is that these books are intended to teach and foster good reading habits and taste. Stevenson teaches young readers to appreciate rhythm and sound, the feel of good English writing. Encountering his world trains readers to enjoy, not just reading, but reading high-quality fiction. Watch how he uses hyphenated phrases to heighten the specificity of his descriptions delightfully: “sea-chest,” “hand-barrow,” “nut-brown” and “grog-shop” come from scanning the first few paragraphs alone. His famous “pirate dialect” is lilting and strange but never baffling; like a few paragraphs of dense Shakespearian dialog, by the end of the passage we’ve worked out for ourselves the intent, from context and feel if nothing else. This is fiction that pulls the reader gently up to a new height and places us beside the hero, smelling the salt air and piecing out the intimidating jargon of his new comrades right alongside him. Whether in tone, content, or style, Stevenson is unafraid to expect something of his youthful audience, first and foremost that they aren't so different from himself and probably enjoy stories liberally salted with violence, emotional conflict, stark realism, musical language, and a sense of manful seriousness.

As silly as it cynically seems today in the dismal fluorescent light of modern adulthood, I'm sure you can remember the first time you read about Jim Hawkins' daring adventures and, planted firmly in the swaying crow's nest of your bunk bed, measured yourself silently against his fictional achievements. Could you have kept your head while Israel Hands crawled hand over hand up the rigging towards you with death glinting in his rum-soaked eyes? That small thrill of importance is a vital component to add to our shelf. Young men crave measurement. They desperately need gates to pass through and fences to leap, even imaginary ones. The wise guide litters their young life with these moments to call them up a little higher.

You're smart as paint, y'are lad. I seen that since the moment I clapped eyes on you.