Record Number: 20132
Reading Experience:
Evidence:
'I cannot tell how I feel, who can ever? I feel like a person in a novel of George Sand�s; I feel a desire to go out of the house, and begin life anew in the cool blue night. Never to come back here; never, never. Only to go on forever by sunny day and gray day, by bright night and foul, by highway and byway, town and hamlet, until somewhere by a roadside or in some clean inn, clean death opened his arms to me, and took me to his quiet heart forever.'
Century:1850-1899
Date:Until: May 1875
Country:Probably Scotland
Timen/a
Place:city: Probably Edinburgh.
county: Lothian
(Reader):
silent aloud unknown
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown
(Listener):
solitary in company unknown
single serial unknown
Reader / Listener / Reading Group:
Reader: Age:Adult (18-100+)
Gender:Male
Date of Birth:13 Nov 1850
Socio-Economic Group:Professional / academic / merchant / farmer
Occupation:Aspiring writer and intermittent law student
Religion:Uncommitted
Country of Origin:Scotland
Country of Experience:Probably Scotland
Listeners present if any:e.g family, servants, friends
n/a
Additional Comments:
n/a
Text Being Read:
Author: Title:unknown
Genre:Fiction
Form of Text:Print: Book
Publication Detailsn/a
Provenanceunknown
Source Information:
Record ID:20132
Source:Robert Louis Stevenson
Editor:Bradford A. Booth
Title:The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson, April 1874-July 1879
Place of Publication:New Haven and London
Date of Publication:1994
Vol:2
Page:136
Additional Comments:
Section headed Saturday in Letter 388, To Frances Sitwell, Thursday [? May 1875] [Swanston]. Co-editor Ernest Mehew. The date in square brackets has been added by the editors.
Citation:
Robert Louis Stevenson, Bradford A. Booth (ed.), The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson, April 1874-July 1879, (New Haven and London, 1994), 2, p. 136, http://www.open.ac.uk/Arts/reading/UK/record_details.php?id=20132, accessed: 12 February 2026
Additional Comments:
In Volume 2 of the Letters RLS has so far mentioned George Sand�s novels La Comtesse de Rudolstadt and Consuelo (see Letter 276). It is difficult to establish whether the mood he evokes here is paralleled in a particular George Sand novel, or more generally throughout her works.
