Reading Experience Database
1450-1945

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Record 12852

Reading Experience:

Evidence:
After lunch was always a pleasant time at Vailima...that was the time Louis usually chose to read aloud something he had written. We were an eager, attentive audience, and when he had finished he welcomed suggestions and we were free to say whatever we liked. Usually we were unanimously enthusiastic, especially over chapters of 'Weir of Hermiston'...once, however, he read a story called 'The Witch Woman' that none of us cared for very much. My mother said it showed the influence of a Swedish author Louis had been reading, and was not in his own clear, individual style. She made no comment when he sent it to his publisher, and nothing more was heard of 'The Witch Woman'.
Century: 1850-1899
Date: Between 7 Dec 1889 and 3 Dec 1894
Country: Samoa
Time: afternoon: After lunch
Place: city: Vailima, near Mount Vaea
specific address: 'Vailima'
   
Type of Experience (Reader):
silent aloud unknown
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown
Type of Experience (Listener):
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown

Reader/Listener/Reading Group:

Reader:Robert Louis Stevenson
Age Adult (18-100+)
Gender Male
Date of Birth 13 Nov 1850
Socio-economic group: Professional / academic / merchant / farmer
Occupation: Writer
Religion: Church of Scotland
Country of origin: Scotland
Country of experience: Samoa
Listeners present if any:
(e.g. family, servants, friends, workmates)
Fanny Stevenson (wife); Isobel Field (step-daughter)
Additional comments: n/a

 

Text Being Read:

Author: Robert Louis Stevenson
Title: Weir of Hermiston
Genre: Fiction
Form of Text: Manuscript: Unknown
Publication details: n/a
Provenance: owned

 

Source Information:

Record ID: 12852  
Source - Print  
  Author: Isobel Field
  Editor: n/a
  Title: This Life I've Loved
  Place of Publication: London
  Date of Publication: 1937
  Vol: n/a
  Page: 294
  Additional comments: Memoir of Stevenson's step-daughter, Isobel Field (previously Strong, nee Osbourne).

Citation: Isobel Field, This Life I've Loved (London, 1937), p. 294, http://can-red-lec.library.dal.ca/Arts/reading/recorddetails2.php?id=12852, accessed: 29 March 2024

Additional comments:

'Weir of Hermiston' was unfinished at the time of Stevenson's death on 3 December 1894.

 

 

Reading Experience Database version 2.0.  Page updated: 27th Apr 2016  3:15pm (GMT)