Untitled (Belle, King Kalakaua and Mrs Stevenson), p.41

Category

Museums & Galleries Item

Item no

19367

Title

p. 41, Untitled (Belle, King Kalakaua and Mrs T Stevenson)

Description

A Hawaiian feast is laid out on the floor of a house. King Kalakaua is sitting wearing a black bow tie, dark jacket and white trousers. He has a flower garland round his neck. To his right sits Belle Strong and to his left Margaret Stevenson sits in a wicker rocking chair. Mrs Stevenson has a dark dress, white cap and a floral garland. Fanny Stevenson is stretched out on the floor in front of them, talking to a mustached man. Wooden doors and a sideboard can be seen in the background as well as a maid standing with a large fan.

The image is from the photograph album entitled 'The Cruise of the Casco' of Robert Louis Stevenson's travels around Hawaii and French Polynesia in 1888.

Artist / maker

Osbourne, Lloyd

Date

1889

Size

17 x 20.6 cm

Type

Photograph

Location

Writers' Museum

Kalakaua I (1836-1891) was the king of Hawaii from 1874-1891. He is sometimes referred to as The Merrie Monarch.

Hawaii is a state of the United States of America, located in the central Pacific Ocean. It became part of the Union in 1959, making it the 50th state. Its capital is Honolulu on the island of Oahu. When Stevenson visited Hawaii it was an independent kingdom. The 1887 Constitution of the Kingdom of Hawaii however stripped the Hawaiian monarchy of much of its authority, disenfranchised most of the native population and transferred power to American, European and native Hawaiian elites. This was followed by the forced creation of the Republic of Hawaii in 1893, the abdication of Queen Liliuokalani and Hawaii's annexation by the United States of America in 1898.

Margaret Stevenson (nee Balfour) was Robert Louis Stevenson's mother. Fanny (nee Vandegrift) was his wife, who is pictured here with Belle; her daughter from her first marriage to Sam Osbourne.

Born in Edinburgh on 13th November 1850, Robert Louis Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, essayist, playwright and travel writer. Although he was plagued by ill health all his life, he was extraordinarily well-travelled, visiting Europe, America and the South Seas. He married American born Fanny Van de Grift Osbourne in 1880 and is best-known for works like Treasure Island (1883), Kidnapped and The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (both 1886). From the late 1880s, Stevenson stayed in the South Pacific with his family on his own estate in Vailima in Samoa. He died here on the 3rd December 1894 of a brain haemorrhage at the age of 44, leaving what many consider his best work, Weir of Hermiston (1896) unfinished.

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Related subjects

People > Adults > Men

People > Adults > Women

People > Domestic > Servants

People > Politics and government > Kings

Places > North America > Hawaii

Sport and leisure > Activities > Eating and drinking

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