RLS in 1885

Editor's Preface

I am only a Scotchman, after all, you see...[1]
- RLS, Edinburgh, 1879

Robert Louis Stevenson was a native of Edinburgh, born at 8, Howard Place, Inverleith Row, on November 13th, 1850. His passion for the city and the capital county, Midlothian, was lifelong and resulted in several works of fiction connected with the area, from the early story The Pentland Rising (1866), to the mature Weir of Hermiston (1896), not to mention various scenes in Kidnapped (1885). Indeed, even his The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), although set in London, was inspired by the notorious double life of the C18th Edinburgh locksmith and thief, Deacon Brodie. But with Edinburgh: Picturesque Notes, we have Stevenson almost in travelogue mode akin to his Gallic odyssey of the previous year, An Inland Voyage (1878), albeit suffused throughout with a novelist's sensibility and a keen indigene's sense of the city's mythology.

Yet Stevenson's Edinburgh is (typically, for a late Victorian), a British, imperial Edinburgh - the majority of his historical anecdotes date from the post-1707 period, even if a latent, though mild, nationalist air seeps through his text at numerous points. Nonetheless, Edinburgh: Picturesque Notes often belies its own Romanticist title, shifting into the darker, Modern conditions of Edinburgh life with a Bohemian relish for the flavour of the city's seedier and distinctly less "picturesque" aspects. Thankfully, for his fellow-native readers, Stevenson is no Scott, and a certain Realist grit lurks behind the words. We read in several places of its alcoholic underclass, of notorious crimes committed in its back-streets, and of its social scandals, in a way which only a true and knowledgeable lover of the city could dispatch without lapsing into crass national or regional stereotypes. Overall, this is a view of Edinburgh from the inside, despite its inevitable touristic lapses.

Our current edition is based on that published by Seeley of London in 1895, containing twenty-seven illustrations by several artists. This, coupled with its 182 pages has forced us to separate the text into ten pages of one chapter each, to accommodate comfortable reading. In preparing this text, we have attempted to retain as much of the original typesetting of the 1895 edition as possible. However, we also plan to include material from the first edition of 1879, once we have acquired a copy (this text is somewhat in demand in Edinburgh itself!).

To browse through the chapters, please use the numbered links at the bottom of each page. And - walcome tae Embro!

Steve Sweeney-Turner, Edinburgh, August 2000

[1] Robert Louis Stevenson, Letter to Edmund Gosse, Swanston, Lothianburn, Edinburgh, July 24, 1879, in ed. Sidney Colvin, The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson to his Family and Friends (London: Methuen, 1900), Vol.1, p.135.

	This edition © Ogmios Press 2000 (all rights reserved) Original copy published London, Seeley, 1895
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