0 Reactions

Treasure Island

Treasure Island AuthorRobert Louis StevensonOriginal titleThe Sea Cook: A Story for BoysCountryScotlandLanguageEnglishSubjectsPirates, coming-of-ageGenreAdventure fictionYoung adult literaturePublisherLondon: Cassell and Company14 November 1883(serialised 1881�82)Pages292 (first edition)OCLC610014604TextTreasure Island at Wikisource
Treasure Island (originally titled The Sea Cook: A Story for Boys) is an adventure novel by Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson, telling a story of "buccaneers and buried gold". It is considered a coming-of-age story and is noted for its atmosphere, characters, and action.

The novel was originally serialised from 1881 to 1882 in the children's magazine Young Folks, under the title Treasure Island or the Mutiny of the Hispaniola, credited to the pseudonym "Captain George North". It was first published as a book on 14 November 1883 by Cassell & Co.. It has since become one of the most often dramatized and adapted of all novels, in numerous media.

Since its publication, Treasure Island has had significant influence on depictions of pirates in popular culture, including such elements as deserted tropical islands, treasure maps marked with an "X", and one-legged seamen with parrots perched on their shoulders.

Plot
Stevenson's map of Treasure Island
Jim Hawkins hiding in the apple-barrel, listening to the pirates
In the mid-18th century, an old sailor named Billy Bones lodges at the rural Admiral Benbow Inn on England's Bristol Channel. He tells the innkeeper's son, Jim Hawkins, to keep a lookout for "a one-legged seafaring man". A former shipmate named Black Dog confronts Bones and they get into a fight, causing Black Dog to flee. A blind beggar named Pew then visits the inn, delivering a summons to Bones called "the black spot". Shortly thereafter, Bones suffers a stroke and dies. Pew and his accomplices attack the inn, but are routed by excise officers, and Pew is trampled to death. Jim and his mother escape with a mysterious packet from Bones' sea chest, which is found to contain a map of an island on which the infamous pirate Captain Flint hid his treasure. Jim shows the map to the local physician Dr. Livesey and the squire John Trelawney, and they decide to make an expedition to the island, with Jim serving as a cabin boy. They set sail on Trelawney's schooner, the Hispaniola, under Captain Smollett. While hidden in an apple-barrel, Jim overhears a conversation among the Hispaniola's crew which reveals that many of them are pirates who had served on Captain Flint's ship, the Walrus, with the most notable being the ship's one-legged cook Long John Silver. They plan to mutiny after the salvage of the treasure, and to murder the captain and the loyal men.

Arriving at the island, Jim joins the shore party and they begin to explore. He meets a marooned pirate named Ben Gunn, who is also a former member of Flint's crew. The mutineers arm themselves, and Smollett's loyal men take refuge in an abandoned stockade, where the mutineers attack them. Jim makes his way to the Hispaniola and cuts the ship from its anchor, allowing the ship to drift along the ebb tide. He boards the Hispaniola, and encounters the pirate Israel Hands, who had been injured in a dispute with one of his companions. Hands helps Jim beach the schooner in the northern bay, then attempts to kill Jim with a knife, but Jim shoots him dead with two pistols.

Jim goes ashore and returns to the stockade, where he is horrified to find only Silver and the pirates. Silver tells Jim that when everyone found the ship was gone, Captain Flint's party had agreed to a truce whereby they take the map and allow the besieged party to leave. In the morning, Livesey arrives to treat the wounded and sick pirates and tells Silver to look out for trouble once he's found the site of the treasure. Silver and the others set out with the map, taking Jim along as a hostage. They find a skeleton with its arms oriented toward the treasure, unnerving the party. Ben Gunn scares the crew by shouting Captain Flint's last words from the forest, making the pirates believe that Flint's ghost is haunting the island. They eventually find the treasure cache, but it is empty. The pirates prepare to charge at Silver and Jim, but they are ambushed by the officers along with Gunn. Livesey explains that Gunn had already found the treasure and taken it to his cave. The expedition members load much of the treasure onto the Hispaniola and depart the island, with Silver on board as a prisoner. At their first port, in Spanish America, Silver steals a bag of money and escapes. The rest of the crew sails back to Bristol and divides up the treasure. Jim says that there is more left on the island, but he for one will not undertake another voyage.

Free books android app tbrJar TBR JAR Read Free books online gutenberg

Load Full (0)