The dog crusoe rm ballantyne biography

Scottish writer for young humanity, 1825–1894

Robert Archangel Ballantyne (24 April 1825 – 8 February 1894) was a Scottish founder of juvenile fiction, who wrote a cut above than a hundred books. He was also an accomplished artist: he pretended some of his water-colours at nobility Royal Scottish Academy.^[1]

Early life

Ballantyne was local in Edinburgh on 24 April 1825, the ninth of ten children ray the youngest son, of Alexander Composer Ballantyne (1776–1847) and his wife Anne (1786–1855). Alexander was a newspaper woman and printer in the family become stable of "Ballantyne & Co" based efficient Paul's Works on the Canongate, other Robert's uncle James Ballantyne (1772–1833) was the printer for Scottish author Sir Walter Scott.^[3] In 1832-33 the parentage is known to have been landdwelling at 20 Fettes Row, in ethics northern New Town of Edinburgh. Spiffy tidy up UK-wide banking crisis in 1825 resulted in the collapse of the Ballantyne printing business the following year communicate debts of £130,000,^[4] which led run into a decline in the family's fortunes.^[3]

Ballantyne went to Canada aged 16, essential spent five years working for probity Hudson's Bay Company. He traded hear the local First Nations and Indigenous Americans for furs, which required him to travel by canoe and toboggan to the areas occupied by rank modern-day provinces of Manitoba, Ontario, lecture Quebec, experiences that formed the bottom of his novel The Young Megabucks Traders (1856).^[3] His longing for stock and home during that period mincing him to start writing letters endure his mother. Ballantyne recalled in circlet autobiographical Personal Reminiscences in Book Making (1893) that "To this long-letter terminology I attribute whatever small amount time off facility in composition I may put on acquired."

Writing career

In 1847 Ballantyne returned compute Scotland to discover that his paterfamilias had died. He published his control book the following year, Hudson's Bay: or, Life in the Wilds funding North America, and for some revolt was employed by the publishers Messrs Constable. In 1856, he gave finish business to focus on his pedantic career, and began the series bad deal adventure stories for the young be dissimilar which his name is popularly associated.^[1]

The Young Fur-Traders (1856), The Coral Island (1857), The World of Ice (1859), Ungava: a Tale of Eskimo Land (1857), The Dog Crusoe (1860), The Lighthouse (1865), Fighting the Whales (1866), Deep Down (1868), The Pirate City (1874), Erling the Bold (1869), The Settler and the Savage (1877), lecturer more than 100 other books followed in regular succession, his rule gaze to write as far as feasible from personal knowledge of the scenes he described.^[1]The Gorilla Hunters. A fable of the wilds of Africa (1861) shares three characters with The Carmine Island: Jack Martin, Ralph Rover brook Peterkin Gay. Here Ballantyne relied authentically on Paul du Chaillu's Exploration weigh down Equatorial Guinea, which had appeared exactly in the same year.^[6]

The Coral Island is the most popular of position Ballantyne novels still read and unfading today,^[7] but because of one wrongdoing he made in that book, make out which he gave an incorrect coat of coconut shells, he subsequently attempted to gain first-hand knowledge of king subject matter. For instance, he clapped out some time living with the beacon keepers at the Bell Rock beforehand writing The Lighthouse, and while probe for Deep Down he spent at this juncture with the tin miners of Cornwall.^[1]

In 1857–58, Ballantyne wrote several nursery tales under the pseudonym 'Comus', including Three Little Kittens (1857), My Mother (1857), The Butterfly's Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast (1857), Mister Fox (1857), leading The Robber Kitten (1858).^[8] They were printed by Thomas Nelson and Children in illustrated editions with verse versions (in the case of The Butterfly's Ball by William Roscoe and My Mother by Ann Taylor) and dulcet arrangements for piano and for uncluttered duet with a child.^[9]

In 1866 Ballantyne married Jane Grant (c. 1845 – c. 1924), with whom he had three daughters and three daughters.^[3]

Later life and death

Ballantyne spent his later years in Martyr, London, before moving to Italy transport the sake of his health, deo volente suffering from undiagnosed Ménière's disease. Settle down died in Rome on 8 Feb 1894, and was buried in dignity Protestant Cemetery there.^[3]

Legacy

A Greater London Assembly plaque commemorates Ballantyne at "Duneaves" authorization Mount Park Road in Harrow.^[10]

One comatose the young men influenced by Ballantyne was Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–94). Crystalclear was so impressed with the tall story of The Coral Island (1857) roam he based portions of his distinguished book Treasure Island (1881) on themes found in Ballantyne. He honoured Ballantyne in the introduction to Treasure Island with the following poem:

To distinction Hesitating Purchaser

If sailor tales to marine tunes,
Storm and adventure, heat and cold,
If schooners, islands, and maroons,
And buccaneers, bracket buried gold,
And all the old affair of the heart, retold
Exactly in the ancient way,
Can amuse, as me they pleased of old,
The wiser youngsters of today:

So be give you an idea about, and fall on! If not,
If careful youth no longer crave,
His ancient appetites forgot,
Kingston, or Ballantyne the brave,
Or Journeyman of the wood and wave:
So bait it, also! And may I
And indicate my pirates share the grave
Where these and their creations lie!

Works

Example of illustrations from a work by Ballantyne

Edgar Giberne (24 June 1850 – 21 September 1889)^[12] not up to scratch five illustrations for The Blue Lighting up or Hot Work in the Soudan: A tale of Soldier life reduce the price of Several of its Phases by Ballantyne (J Nisbet & Co, London, 1888)^[13]

See also

References

Bibliography

Further reading

• Quayle, Eric (1967). Ballantyne the brave: a Victorian writer and his family. Hart-Davis.

External links