Treasure Island: An Analysis Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson, is an adventure tale full of exciting characters and set in exotic locations. This article will present background information about both the novel and its author and will analyze and discuss the major characters, themes, and motifs. Stevenson was born the only child of a wealthy, middle-class family in Edinburgh, Scotland, in November 1850. His father, Thomas, was a civil engineer who specialized in the design and construction of lighthouses. His mother, Margaret, was the daughter of a well-known clergyman (Livesey). Probably the two most important influences during Stevenson's childhood were his family's strict Presbyterian religion and his poor health. During his frequent bouts of tuberculosis, his loving nurse, Alison Cunningham, loved to regale him with tales of bloody deeds, hellfire, and damnation. This made him a frightened, guilt-ridden and apparently somewhat prudish child, a trait he certainly outgrew by the time he reached his late teens (Harvey). Stevenson was inspired to write Treasure Island after drawing a treasure map with his twelve-year-old son, Lloyd (Sandison). Written as a memoir, the work opens with the line "Squire Trelawney, Doctor Livesey and the rest of these gentlemen have asked me to write down all the particulars of Treasure Island, from beginning to end, not retaining nothing but the of the island, and only because there is still treasure unharvested, I take up the pen in the year of grace 17-, and go back to the time when my father kept the Admiral Benbow Inn, and the old brown Sailors, with cutlass, first took his quarters under our roof” (Stevenson 10). This opening suits Stevenson who had a “devotion to the art of letters and to the less sophisticated life of adventure, though not necessarily childish" (Kiely 20). Stevenson would later reveal that the first fifteen chapters of Treasure Island were written in as many days (Swinnerton 64). The main character of the story, a boy named Jim Hawkins, serves as first-person narrator.The son of an innkeeper, Jim begins the story with the arrival of a salty old ex-pirate at his family's inn, the Admiral Benbow Inn. Jim is described as very humble, never boasting about his many exciting and impressive deeds.