Diary of a Lighthouse Keeper, 20th October 2024
I’m in Edinburgh for a few days, attending rehearsals for the Orkney version of Treasure Island, which I’ve written for the Lyceum Theatre. As well as the original novel, I’ve also drawn inspiration from Robert Louis Stevenson’s own life. It was his lighthouse-building family’s connections with Orkney that made me feel justified in altering the voyage of the good ship Hispaniola. In my version, instead of sailing from Devon to the Caribbean, it sails from Leith to Scapa Flow. And instead of a talking parrot there’s a talking puffin.
I’ve researched RLS and his family, not least at the Edinburgh Writing Museum halfway up Lady Close’s Stairs. It houses a fascinating collection, including many personal items from the most important Auld Reekie writers, namely Ian Rankin, JK Rowling and Irvine Welsh. There’s also a small section devoted to Robert Louis Stevenson.
I found the curator and explained my special interest in Stevenson’s Orkney connections. At this point she raised an eyebrow, and asked if I’d like to see an interesting document recently acquired. The museum had been gifted it anonymously a few months ago, she said, but they hadn’t been able to establish its authenticity, so it’s not yet on display. She disappeared into a back room, and returned a few minutes later with a manilla folder. Placing it on a countertop, she carefully withdrew several foolscap pages, held together with a loop of tarred string, and covered in closely packed but elegant handwriting in faded fountain-pen ink. At the top, in capitals, was a title: AN ISLAND VOYAGE.
‘We can’t prove it’s by Stevenson,’ said the curator, ‘but the handwriting bears a close resemblance to other manuscripts we have by him. And the title prefigures his later book about canoeing through Belgium, An Inland Voyage. All in all, it’s very suggestive.’
‘And you say this relates to Orkney?’ I said, as I tried to make out the first faint sentences. ‘I know he visited with his father in 1869. Could it be an account of that trip?’
‘Maybe you could read it,’ she said, ‘and identify the places and personal names mentioned: that would be some confirmation of authenticity. If it doesn’t match reality, it might be a piece of much later fiction by Stevenson – or by some other writer entirely.’
‘Why would anyone want to imitate Stevenson and then produce just these few pages?’ I said.
‘Writers are a funny lot,’ she replied. ‘And I should know. I run a museum dedicated to them.’
Clearly I couldn’t borrow this unique manuscript, but she did allow me to take photos on my phone. As long as I stress that this is an unauthenticated Stevenson manuscript, I’m allowed to reproduce my transcription of it here. I will do so over the next four weeks, starting now:
AN ISLAND VOYAGE
We skirted the knuckle of Caithness, the weather being clement enough to necessitate no pause in the bleak, Godforsaken town of Wick. My stay there last summer, supposedly to oversee the building of a new breakwater, was the grimmest month of my eighteen years.
Not only was the town as cold as charity, but the labourers engaged by my father spoke Gaelic to a man, and made no effort to understand me. Not that I could usefully instruct them in their work, knowing as little of marine engineering as they did of poetry.
I am told that the inhabitant of the islands that lie before us speak not that Irish tongue, but a blend of English and Old Norse. I have conned Sir Walter’s novel The Pirate, and hope what I gleaned from it, in conjunction with whatever modicum of English the islanders can muster, will enable me to understand and be understood.
For I am anxious to avoid as entirely as I can the tedious waystations of this voyage on the Pharos – viz. the lighthouses constructed by my father. ‘In salutem omnium’ – yes, for those lost at sea and in need of direction. But for those of us sailing on the ocean of imagination, no construction of stone, glass and iron will suffice.
Instead, our way is lit by stories – of witches selling winds, of druidical megaliths, and of swashbuckling pirates. It is the prospect of those that makes this voyage bearable.
And yet tedium stretches its talons towards me. I look up from this journal to see us heaving to in proximity of a green-capped, rock-girded isle. The crew are readying the jolly boat for a shore party. At either end of the island stands a white Stevenson lighthouse, one tall and graceful, one short and squat.
They make a fine Tweedledum and Tweedledee. But I’m told their names are Hoy High and Hoy Low.
To be continued.
You can read more about the Lyceum Theatre’s production of Treasure Island on their website. And buy tickets!
This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 23rd October 2024. A new diary appears weekly. I post them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations, and occasional small corrections or additions.