Review: Kidnapped
Kidnapped, Robert Louis Stevenson [ "Kidnapped" by Robert Louis Stevenson (first published in 1886 this edition Penguin Classics 1994, introduction by Donald McFarlan ). Classic historical adventure novel set in C18 Scotland.]
I remember lying in bed listening to “Kidnapped” on the radio. And when the radio was turned off, going to sleep with dreams of adventures, wicked uncles, piracy at sea, survival on the moors and coming into an inheritance and a great future. (Well life did not work out like that!) It was a great tale of adventure and the overcoming of adversity, which lead to a wonderful and moral conclusion.
It was written as a "boys' novel" and first published as a serial in the magazine “Young Folks" from May to July 1886, so my reaction to it at that time is not so surprising.
When this book was recommended for the group to read, I looked forward to it, reliving the past. Now you are probably waiting for the “But”. Sorry to disappoint, there really is not one, but (damn) at my later age (much later) I find there is more to this story than I saw or heard before. Much more.
The novel is set around 18th-century Scottish events, notably the "Appin Murder", which occurred near Ballachulish in 1752 in the aftermath of the Jacobite rising of 1745. Many of the characters were real people, including one of the principals, Alan Breck Stewart. The story was therefore written 134 years after the events.
The full title of the book is:
Kidnapped: Being Memoirs of the Adventures of David Balfour in the Year 1751: How he was Kidnapped and Cast away; his Sufferings in a Desert Isle; his Journey in the Wild Highlands; his acquaintance with Alan Breck Stewart and other notorious Highland Jacobites; with all that he Suffered at the hands of his Uncle, Ebenezer Balfour of Shaws, falsely so-called: Written by Himself and now set forth by Robert Louis Stevenson.
So there it is. Those are the bones of the story. Note that the Desert Isle is only a few miles down the coast of Scotland not the sandy South Sea island that my imagination would have it. Not the Treasure Island, also written by RLS some five years earlier.
At the start of the story the naïve David Balfour sets out to claim his inheritance, and discovers how a lot of people conspire to make sure that he does not do that. As the story progresses we are shown his encounter with the swashbuckler Alan Breck and how that relationship develops into an unlikely friendship. Alan Breck is a pretty well documented adventurer whose escapades are woven into this tale and he introduces many other non-fictional characters into the tale and this in turn gives insight into the lives of people of Scotland at that time. We see the clan system, Highlanders versus Lowlanders and how the English tried to subjugate the inhabitants. And the beginnings of the notorious "highland clearances"!
When I was listening, I was the Hero. Maybe the adaptation played down some areas that would have left me horrified, that all this could have happened to ordinary people. The duplicity, the corruption and the inhumanity of the times. I would have made judgements of that age, which now at my age would have been unworthy. However, now, while I still see all that injustice, I can better bear it, and read more of it, without sinking into either despair about the human race or taking up arms (or joining the SNP).
[he writing, by the standards of today, is very stilted, particularly the conversations and they are often written in “Scottish” dialect and Gaelic words. Also the lawyer uses Latin phrases, which are not translated for us “uneducated” readers. It makes it a bit of a difficult read at times. But it does add to the characters and does not really detract from the story, if you ignore it. Maybe I should have translated, or made more use of the glossary and I might have got more from what was being said. But that would have really made too many stops and all flow would have gone.
I hope I have not put you off reading this book, it is to my mind a good tale, taking me (you) back to a time of hope and excitement in life. But remember to identify with the hero and not with the people he meets along the way. After that, you might like to research a bit about the fascinating politics of the time. A sequence of events following the Jacobite rebellion which extended into the destruction of the Gaelic world of the Highlands, which still has political significance today.
Notes:
There have been several screen versions of Kidnapped and the 1971 version gets good reviews.
I thought that RLS was related to George Stevenson, he of the railways and miners lamp. (Ask me about the Davey lamp and the Geordie lamp, go on, I dare you!) But he is not. He is from the “Lighthouse” Stevensons.
His mothers maiden name was Balfour and his full name was Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson. He dropped Balfour and changed to Louis from Lewis, sounds more arty, eh?
In the introduction to “Rob Roy" (published in 1817), Sir Walter Scott tells of the Appin Murder. This account was thought to have inspired RLS to write Kidnapped.
From Wiki: Jacobitism was a political movement in Great Britain and Ireland that aimed to restore the Roman Catholic Stuart King James VII of Scotland, II of England and Ireland, and his heirs to the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland. The movement took its name from Jacobus, the Renaissance Latin form of Iacomus, the original Latin form of James. Adherents rebelled against the British government on several occasions between 1688 and 1746.
Alan Breck Stewart enlisted in the British Army of George II in 1745, just before the Jacobite rising of that year. He fought at the Battle of Prestonpans, but deserted to the Highland Jacobites. Breck means spotty, which he got from smallpox. After he was immortalised in fiction, Alan Breck Stewart was portrayed as a romantic figure. You might think otherwise.
The King of England (and Scotland) was Charles II (not eleven, silly girl, second!). The prime minister was a Whig. Whigs might be summed up as Protestant gentry. But the whole ideology and politics of that time and its effect on England, Scotland and Ireland, “does me 'ed in”.
~~ ullamh ~~