Black cloth binding with gilt title on the spine.

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                                 An exceedingly good edition of a lovely book.

The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables is a collection of short stories by Robert Louis Stevenson. The title derives from the local name given to a group of waves in the title short story, not from the Merry Men of Robin Hood tales.

Contents:

“The Merry Men” is a short story by Robert Louis Stevenson first published in 1882 in Cornhill Magazine 45-6 (June–July 1882). The story was later published in Stevenson’s collection The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables (1887). It is set on the fictional island Eilean Aros, based on the Isle of Erraid. The title derives from the local name given to a group of waves in the story, not from the Merry Men of Robin Hood and his merry men.

Will o’ the Mill is a very short story. It is a thought provoking story that tells us how meeting with a stranger can make or break our life decisions.

“Markheim” is a short story by Robert Louis Stevenson, originally prepared for the Pall Mall Gazette in 1884, but published in 1885 in The Broken Shaft: Tales of Mid-Ocean as part of Unwin’s Christmas Annual. The story was later published in Stevenson’s collection The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables (1887).

“Thrawn Janet” is a short story, written in Scots, by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson. He wrote the story in the summer of 1881 while he stayed at the rented Kinnaird Cottage in Kinnaird, a hamlet near Pitlochry, with his parents and wife. When he read the story to his wife Fanny Stevenson, she said of it that it “sent a cauld grue [shudder] along my bones” and “fair frightened” Stevenson himself. It was first published in the October 1881 issue of the Cornhill Magazine. It is a dark tale of satanic possession.nThe story was later included in Stevenson’s 1887 collection The Merry Men, and Other Tales and Fables.

“Olalla” is a short story by the novelist, poet, essayist and travel writer Robert Louis Stevenson. It was first published in the Christmas 1885 issue of The Court and Society Review, then re-published in 1887 as part of the collection The Merry Men and Other Tales and Fables. It is set in Spain during the Peninsular War. The story is based on a dream that Stevenson had and in his 1888 essay “A Chapter on Dreams” he describes the difficulties he had in fitting his vision into a narrative framework.Stevenson wrote the story at the same time as he was proofing “Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde” (published 1886)

The Treasure of Franchard – is a short story: Jean-Marie is an orphan who is happily adopted by Doctor Desprez and his wife Anastasie. When the doctor finds the precious Treasure of Franchard he plans to take his family away from their lovely, old country home go to Paris and live a rich life. Jean-Marie does not want to go to Paris and during the night the treasure mysteriously disappears…

Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as Treasure Island, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Kidnapped and A Child’s Garden of Verses.

Born and educated in Edinburgh, Stevenson suffered from serious bronchial trouble for much of his life, but continued to write prolifically and travel widely in defiance of his poor health. As a young man, he mixed in London literary circles, receiving encouragement from Andrew Lang, Edmund Gosse, Leslie Stephen and W. E. Henley, the last of whom may have provided the model for Long John Silver in Treasure Island. In 1890, he settled in Samoa where, alarmed at increasing European and American influence in the South Sea islands, his writing turned away from romance and adventure fiction toward a darker realism. He died of a stroke in his island home in 1894 at age 44.

A celebrity in his lifetime, Stevenson’s critical reputation has fluctuated since his death, though today his works are held in general acclaim. In 2018, he was ranked, just behind Charles Dickens, as the 26th-most-translated author in the world.