Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

Ok, I had to take a short break from reading on the list because James Joyce was making me hate this project. But I'm back and avast, me hearties, I'm better than ever!

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson is a gem of a book. While probably considered children's literature, it still makes for a ripping good tale. Written in the later part of the 19th Century, it isn't as "modern" as most of the other books on the list, but it doesn't really suffer much for that. In fact, after reading Joyce, straightforward prose was an absolute blessing to my eyes.

Treasure Island is the story of a young lad, Jim Hawkins, who works at his family's inn. Due to bizarre circumstance, Jim comes across a map to buried pirate treasure. Sharing this information with the most trustworthy members of his community, Squire Trelawny and Dr. Livesay, the get together a crew to set sail for the tropical island where the treasure is buried. The man they hire as cook is a peg-legged seaman who goes by the name of Long John Silver. Silver, of course, is a pirate who eventually leads a mutiny. I won't say much more about the story itself, but of course, our lad Jim Hawkins is the hero and the mutiny eventually fails (but you all knew that, didn't you?).

Treasure Island is such a good book because its characters and locations are so exceptionally good. In fact, they're so good many have become archetypes. Long John Silver is the model pirate, equipped with a peg leg, a parrot on his shoulder, and a boatload of pirate phrases like "shiver me timbers." The desert island where there's buried treasure...another archetype. This is the very model for an adventure story.

I did have one problem with the narrative however. The book is told from Jim Hawkins's perspective through almost the entire book. Two chapters are told from the doctor's point of view in order to explain how some things came about while Jim was off gallivanting. I think Stevenson was clever enough that he could (and should) have found a better way to fill in that part of the story without having to resort to a rather jarring shift of perspective.

My final thought on the book is that while Jim Hawkins is the hero, Silver is far and away the most interesting character and really what makes the book more than just an adventure story. Long John is a bright, devious, and cunning man. He's always on the lookout for what serves his best advantage and make him either rich or away from the gallows. In some aspects he's heroic and in others he's the blackest villain you're likely to come across. The complexity of the character (and "bigness" of character) of Long John Silver are really what move Treasure Island into the category of classic literature.