Classic
Treasure Island
by Robert Louis Stevenson
Summary
Young Jim Hawkins finds a treasure map in a dead sailor's chest and sails for a distant island aboard the Hispaniola, unaware that the ship's charming one legged cook, Long John Silver, is a pirate planning mutiny. Stevenson drives the plot through betrayals, sieges, and shifting loyalties, with Silver playing both sides so skillfully that readers never quite stop liking him. The novel fixed the popular image of piracy, from parrots and peg legs to X marks the spot, for every generation since.
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Historical Context & Significance
Stevenson began the book to entertain his stepson, publishing it serially in 1881 and as a book in 1883. It became the model for the modern adventure story and has never left print.