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What did Robert Louis Stevenson suffer from? Did Stevenson have tuberculosis?

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Robert Louis Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet, and travel writer. He is best known for works such as Treasure Island, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Kidnapped, and A Child’s Garden of Verses.

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What did Robert Louis Stevenson suffer from?

It is possible that Stevenson had hereditary hemorrhagic telangiectasia (Osler-Rendu-Weber Syndrome). This would explain his chronic respiratory complaints, recurrent episodes of pulmonary hemorrhage, and his death, at age 44 years, of probable cerebral hemorrhage.

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Did Stevenson have tuberculosis?

His best-known works are probably Treasure Island (1881-3), Kidnapped (1886), and The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (also 1886). Throughout his life, Stevenson suffered from respiratory symptoms that were attributed to “consumption”—pulmonary tuberculosis.

Stevenson had many occasions to think about his mortality. Frequently ill since childhood, he’d suffered from a chronic lung ailment with symptoms typical of tuberculosis, including breathing problems and spitting up blood.


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