The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson

Volume Three covers the period from August 1879 to September 1882 and comprises some 350 letters, many of them previously unpublished. It tells the full story of Stevenson's reckless journey to California as 'An Amateur Emigrant', in the face of strong opposition from his family and friends, on his quest to marry an American woman, Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne who had at that time still to obtain a divorce from a previous marriage. This journey changed Stevenson's life.