More than 200 feature films and television episodes have been adapted in one way or another from the works of the celebrated Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson, many of them variations on his novels Treasure Island (published in 1883), The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886) and Kidnapped (1886); or his earlier trilogy of detective fiction short stories The Suicide Club (1878).

In addition to being a writer of stirring fiction, Stevenson (1850-1894) was a poet, essayist and travel writer. He was born in Edinburgh into a family of lighthouse designers and builders, but his poor health and lack of interest in the family business prompted him to follow his urge to write after an early study of law.

He married Fanny Osbourne, an older divorced American and the mother of two. It is said that the idea for Treasure Island came to him while drawing a treasure map with his twelve-year-old stepson. Although the family lived in France and California and on an island in Samoa, Stevenson retained his loyalty to Scotland and his regard for its customs and traditions.

Among his most popular works is Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the famous story of duality within mankind, which was glossily produced by MGM in 1941 and harrowingly acted by Spencer Tracy; it is one of the more offbeat interpretations of this tale. Not well received at the time, perhaps because Tracy's performance in the role followed Oscar®-winner Fredric March's by only ten years, this version has seen its reputation grow over the years.

The Body Snatcher (1945), produced by RKO horror master Val Lewton and directed by Robert Wise, is based on a short story by Stevenson of the same title published in 1884. Boris Karloff gives one of his most chilling performances as a grave-robber-turned-murderer.

The Secret of St. Ives (1949), based on the Stevenson novel St. Ives: Being the Adventures of a French Prisoner in England (1897), stars Richard Ney as the beleaguered head of a group of French prisoners during the Napoleonic Wars. The novel, unfinished by Stevenson, was completed in 1898 by Arthur Quiller-Couch.

Treasure Island (1950), Disney's definitive movie version of the often-filmed novel that established Stevenson's popularity, is one of the most rousing family adventures ever made, with Robert Newton delivering a truly scary performance as villain Long John Silver. The British black comedy The Wrong Box (1966) is adapted from the 1889 novel co-written by Stevenson and his stepson, Lloyd Osbourne. It's the tale of the last two participants in a tontine (a financial arrangement in which the final survivor takes the entire prize). They happen to be brothers, and one of them wants to make sure the other dies before he does. The astonishing cast includes Ralph Richardson, John Mills, Michael Caine, Peter Cook, Dudley Moore and Peter Sellers.

by Roger Fristoe