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At dawn on 7 December 1889, when the rays of the rising sun lit up the slopes of Mount generously Vaea, in the harbor village of Apia (Apia) came in a small schooner. Soon the streets of this village appeared very tall, thin man in a sports hat, velvet jacket and flannel trousers, who was in his arm a little dark woman with an unusually expressive, luminous eyes. It was roomy cotton dress and sandals on bare feet and a wide-brimmed straw hat, trimmed with shells, and even massive gold earrings and exotic necklace of some kind of red berries. European settlers in Apia initially treated disrespectfully to these strangers, taking them for the stroller. Thus, according to eyewitnesses, began Samoan saga of Lewis and Fanny Stevenson, of which they themselves - in the diary and letters - tell in this book.

Stevenson went to Samoa is already world-famous writer. The famous adventure novel “Treasure Island”, a fantastic story “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the novels” Kidnapped “and” Black Arrow “, in which the writer turned to the past of England and Scotland, was opened to him the hearts and minds of many millions of readers.

Stevenson was born on November 13, 1850 in Edinburgh, political and cultural center of Scotland, the son of renowned engineer, co-owner of a large firm, which has built lighthouses and port facilities. Father was a writer-hard conservative and deeply religious man. But the son did not inherit any profession his father, or his views.

Already in childhood and adolescence in Lewis appeared qualities such as desire for independence, the propensity to self-examination, the rejection of truths and domestic conventions, and this gave impetus to a romantic quest. Categorically refusing to study at the Faculty of Engineering, University of Edinburgh, as urged by his father, Lewis received a law degree and was admitted to the bar, but preferred her free life writer and wanderer. Youthful enthusiasm for the ideas of Charles Darwin, Herbert Spencer and the utopian socialists did Lewis freethinker. In his letters to his father, written during this period, there are sharp attacks against religion and the privileged classes, which nearly led to a break with his family. In the future, Lewis resigned to the idea of God, but before the end of his days refused to join any church.

Specific social phenomena Stevenson considered in terms of compliance with its standards of honesty, generosity, faithfulness, etc. As an honest and humane man, Stevenson denounced the greed, hypocrisy and deceit inherent in bourgeois civilization, denied the national and racial inequality, angrily protested against the excesses of the British colonizers in the Transvaal, and in the last years of his life trying to help friends Samoans. However, valuing loyalty as one of the highest virtues, he always remained a loyal subject of Queen Victoria and rapidly react to the slightest disrespect to the British royal family.

In the summer of 1876, traveling to France, Lewis stopped in the village of Grez (near Fontainebleau), where traditionally housed the British and American artists who came to study with renowned barbizontsam. There he met Frances (Fanny) Van de Grift Osbourne, a charming American, as it was called in the village.

Lewis and Fanny loved each other. A married woman, ten years older than Lewis, a man of a circle - it is firmly and irrevocably entered the life of a writer. Despite threats of parents and friends, he talked in 1879, followed her to the United States. The divorce did Fannie free, and May 19, 1880 in San Francisco held their wedding.

Francis Metilda Van de Grift (or Vandergrift, both preferred to write her ancestors Swedish and Dutch descent) was born March 10, 1840 in the U.S. city of Indianapolis in the family of a midlevel businessman, merchant timber and real estate. At seventeen she married a minor judicial official, Sam Osborne. Young couple moved to the south-west United States, the richest silver mining areas of Nevada, the deaf, which settled in the village of miners, and then settled in California. The marriage was unhappy. In 1875, Fannie took the children (fifteen Aysobel, seven by Lloyd and baby Harvey) and went to France. Soon after Harvey died there of tuberculosis. In a quiet village in a circle of friends, artists Fannie suffered befell her loss. Here and there was her encounter with Lewis.

Even as a child, living in Indianapolis, then barely distinguishable from the rural settlement, Fannie learned to sew and cook, cooking, soap, go for the cattle, with a passion to work in the garden and the garden. Love for the land Fannie kept for life.

New features - courage, independence, ability to overcome difficulties, prejudice and contempt for the conventions of middle-class environment - manifested in her grim years of life in Nevada. Here she never parted with a heavy revolver, handmade cigars are smoked, cooked and washed clothes for the whole Artel.

Early stage at Fannie aesthetic sense. In Indianapolis, she was crazy from the local poet S. Bolton, in California has moved closer to writers, musicians and artists. When her daughter discovered talent for painting, Fanny with her began to attend school in San Francisco and received a silver medal for drawing. In France, the mother and daughter also were engaged in painting. I tried to Fannie forces and in the literature. Lewis believed that it has a fine literary taste.

Diligent farmer and emancipated woman of the American Far West, nebestalanny artist and fine writer - this appears to us Fanny Stevenson. Could this be a combination of business-like approach to the spiritual refinement, landing with idealism and love of nature and inexhaustible cheerfulness gave her a special charm in the eyes of Lewis? She became an anchor that binds the writer to the daily reality, and at the same time understands and shares his romantic ideals.

In the mid 70-ies by Lewis began a serious disease of the lungs and bronchi (probably tuberculosis, although one of his latest biographers, E. N. Caldwell, casts doubt on the diagnosis). “Bloody Jack” - the so-called writer throat bleeding - it was a frequent guest. Stevenson lived for a long time the French and British resorts in mountainous areas of the United States. In the summer of 1888 Lewis decided to make a trip to the islands of the Pacific Ocean.

At a rented yacht “Casco” Stevenson went to Polynesia. The first phase of the Pacific odyssey ends in Hawaii. After a six-month stay in Hawaii, Lewis and Fannie have taken a new voyage. On the trading schooner “Equator” they visited numerous small atolls that make up the Micronesian archipelago Gilbert. Then the captain of the Equator “headed for the island of Samoa.

Stevenson charmed nature and people of this archipelago. Proud and loving Samoans seemed to him something like the Scottish Highlanders. In addition, healing climate of Samoa, as well as some other islands, has had a beneficial impact on the seriously ill writer. And Stevenson took an unexpected decision: on the advice of one of the Americans who have settled here, Harry Moores, and at the insistence of Fanny, he bought one hundred and twenty hectares of tropical forest on the hillside Vaea, approximately five miles from Apia. Amateur sonorous names, Lewis called his acquisition Vailimoy ( “five waters” in Samoan) - in honor of a local stream, fed by four tributaries. Cuffs Moores supervision and site clearance and construction of homes, Stevenson served on the steamer “Lubeck” in Australia.

But in other climatic conditions (in Sydney was cool and wet weather) health writer has deteriorated sharply. Therefore, the first merchant ship, sailing to the southern seas, the schooner “Janet Nichol”, Lewis and Fanny went to a new journey to the islands of Oceania.

Upon his return to Sydney from Lewis throat started bleeding again. The verdict of doctors had read: “South Pacific or death.” Stevenson had to abandon the planned trip to England. He sent a Lloyd, son of Fanny from his first marriage, with instructions to sell the villa in Bournemouth and stored there to bring books, paintings and valuable utensils in Apiyu. In September 1890 Stevenson settled in his tropical estate. In Samoan diary Fannie appeared the first record.

When Lewis and Fanny arrived in Vailimu, working there were in full swing. While not willing to large and spacious house (which was later also built another wing), Stevenson settled in uncomplicated plank structure. Fannie plunged into economic affairs. She wanted not only to create maximum comfort in the house, not only for the family’s own food, but also to lay the tropical plantation, which would generate income. Last was hardly attainable, but through the efforts of Fannie mansion soon became habitable form. As for Lewis, he immediately took up literary work, but sometimes with pleasure, and worked on the plantation.

“The sight of these forests, mountains, and unusual flavor upgraded my blood”, - said John Wiltshire, the hero of Stevenson’s “Coast of Thales. And it refers to Lewis. Four vailimskih years were for him very fruitful. Writer completing a book of travel notes “In the South Seas”, creates novels and short stories included in collection “Evening conversations on the island. One of these works, “Coast of Thales, the author himself considered” the first realistic tale of the South Seas. ” Oceanic material is widely used to them as in the novels of “Castaway” and “Ebb”, written in conjunction with Lloyd. But the most significant pieces of art created during this period, Lewis once again appeals to the heart of his beloved Scotland, to the exciting events of its history. On board the “Equator” was It written the last pages of the novel “The Master of Ballantrae.” In 1893, out of print “David Balfour” ( “Catriona”) - continuation of the novel “Kidnapped”. Until the last days of life the writer worked on the two great novels - “St. Ives” and “Wear Germiston. The first of them after the death of Lewis was completed by his envisages an English writer Quiller-Kuchem, another - perhaps the peak of creativity Stevenson - and was left unfinished.