Robert Louis Stevenson

Fables Annotated Robert Louis Stevenson

Fable, as a form of literary art, had at all times a great attraction for Mr. Stevenson; and in an early review of Lord Lytton's Fables in Song he attempted to define some of its proper aims and methods. This class of work, according to his conception of the matter, belonged essentially several of his own semi-supernatural stories, such as "Will of the Mill," "Markheim," and even "Jekyll and Hyde;" in the composition of which there was combined with the dream element, in at least an equal measure, the element of moral allegory or apologue. He was accustomed also to try his hand occasionally on the composition of fables more strictly so called, and cast in the conventional brief and familiar form.