Treasure+Island

Literapedia Book Notes for
=//Treasure Island// by Robert Louis Stevenson=

Characters

 * **Jim Hawkins** (ch #1)—The narrator and principle protagonist
 * **Long John Silver** (ch #8)—A sea cook who leads a mutiny on the Hispaniola
 * **Alexander Smollett** (ch #9)—The distinguished Captain of the Hispaniola
 * **David Livesey** (ch #1)—The ship's doctor
 * **John Trelawney** (ch #6)—The Squire who owns the Hispaniola
 * **John Hunter, Richard Joyce, Tom Redruth** (ch #7)---Three servants of Trelawney who accompany on the voyage
 * **Abraham Gray** (ch #16)---The only loyal member of the crew not killed by Silver
 * **Ben Gunn** (ch #15)---An old shipmate of Silver's who has been marooned on Treasure Island
 * **Billy Bones** (ch #1)---The old sailor whose map is used to locate the treasure
 * **Blind Pew** (ch #3)---A blind pirate who gets killed
 * **Black Dog** (ch #2)---A quick guy who escapes a lot
 * **Israel Hands** (ch #)---The ship's cockswain
 * **Arrow** (ch #10)---The drunken first mate who falls overboard
 * **Jim's Mother** (ch #1)---Jim leaves her to go on the voyage
 * **Captain Flint** (ch #8)---Silver's pet parrot, also the name of a famous now-deceased pirate

Chapter Summaries
Part 1 - The Old Buccaneer Part 2 - The Sea Cook Part 3 - My Shore Adventure Part 4 - The Stockade Part 5 - My Sea Adventure Part 6 - Captain Silver
 * 1) Jim Hawkins writes the story. First, an old sailor shows up at the inn Jim's parents run. He is constantly drunk and seems to be staying indefinitely
 * 2) An old mate of the old sailor (Billy Bones) called Black Dog appears. The two have an argument, and after a scuffle Black Dog escapes.
 * 3) A blind man appears and gives Billy Bones the Black Spot. Billy Bones suddenly dies of apoplexy.
 * 4) Fearing for their lives, Jim and his mother flee to a nearby town. They return to collect the money Bones owes them from his large chest.
 * 5) The blind man (Pew) and other buccaneers return for something from Bones' chest. Jim and his mother manage to stay hidden, and the buccaneers scatter after a supervisor shows up and kills Pew.
 * 6) Jim goes to Squire Trelawney's house. Jim has taken the bag that the buccaneers were looking for. In it a treasure map is found. The Squire plans a voyage to recover it.
 * 1) The Squire writes that he found a ship and a cook for the voyage named Long John Silver, and that Long John Silver put together a crew.
 * 2) Jim sees Silver at his restaurant the "spyglass." As they talk, Jim sees Black Dog again, running out of the "spyglass."
 * 3) Before the voyage begins, the captain, Alexander Smollett, tells the Squire his strong ambivalences about the voyage, particularly his concern that the crew has learned of its supposedly secret purpose.
 * 4) The //Hispaniola// departs. Except for the first mate (an incompetent drunkard called Arrow) falling overboard, the voyage is fairly uneventful until Jim has a snack in an apple barrel.
 * 5) While in the apple barrel, Jim overhears Silver talking to the some crew members. Silver used to sail with the notorious pirate Flint, and now plans to mutiny once the treasure is secured.
 * 6) Jim tells the captain what he overheard. They resolve to stay the course while figuring out what to do, realizing that at the present, the mutineers outnumber them 19 to 7.
 * 1) Silver and others go ashore, leaving six mutineers on board. At the spur of the moment, Jim decides to jump in the boat to go ashore as well.
 * 2) Jim disappears into the wilderness as soon as he reaches shore, and watches from it as Silver kills two members of the crew who would not join the mutiny.
 * 3) Jim meets the savage-like Ben Gunn, a man marooned on the island by Flint some years back. Eventually, they find a stockade.
 * 1) Doctor Livesey narrates - the captain begins stockpiling powder and arms into the jolly-boat. As the loyal members of the crew leave the ship, one of the mutineers, Abraham Gray, is persuaded to join them.
 * 2) The boat sinks and much of the supplies are lost under heavy fire from the mutineers still on the boat, including the cockswain Israel Hands, but the captain and the others get ashore.
 * 3) As they get ashore and head for the stockade, the mutineers attack. The mutineers are swiftly repelled, but Redruth is killed by a stray bullet.
 * 4) Jim resumes narration - Jim enters the stockade and the group of loyalists begin watch. Eventually, they see the flag of truce from Silver.
 * 5) Silver offers an end to violence if the captain will agree to let him and his mutineers have the treasure and go about their business. Smollett flatly refuses.
 * 6) The mutineers make a full-scale attack. Five are killed, and the others finally retreat. Joyce and Hunter are killed in the action as well, and Smollett is wounded.
 * 1) Again, at the spur of the moment, Jim leaves to head for the ship. He rows toward it in a coracle constructed by Ben Gunn.
 * 2) Jim sets the //Hispaniola// going toward shore by cutting the anchoring rope. He notices the remaining pirates on it are fighting.
 * 3) Thinking the ship might be unmanned, he rows back to it, although the coracle is destroyed as he gets on board.
 * 4) Only a drunken Israel Hands remains on the ship. Jim tenuously becomes captain as they attempt to steer the ship to a shore.
 * 5) Eventually, Hands turns on Jim. Although wounded in the process, Jim manages to shoot Hands overboard.
 * 6) Finally bringing the ship to shore, Jim sets out to get back to the rest of his camp. Unfortunately, he is spotted by Silver's parrot, Captain Flint.
 * 1) Jim finds himself Silver's prisoner, with his friends nowhere to be found. Silver is himself worried that the remaining five mutineers may be ready to mutiny him, and the two form an alliance.
 * 2) Silver is given the Black Spot. He manages to buy some time at least by showing the pirates the treasure map he has obtained from the doctor.
 * 3) Dr. Livesey pays a visit. Jim tells him about his docking of the ship. Then, Dr. Livesey promises that he'll try to help Silver get out of his fix if possible.
 * 4) Silver, Jim, and the mutineers set out in search for the treasure. On the way, they find a skeleton of one of Flint's crew pointing the way.
 * 5) While on the hunt, mysterious voices are heard among the trees. The mutineers connect them with Flint, while Silver seems unconcerned. When they reach the end of the map, the treasure is gone.
 * 6) Jim and Silver are saved from the wrath of the mutineers when Livesey, Gunn, and Abraham appear and kill or disperse them. Then they all go to where Ben Gunn had secretly hid the treasure some time earlier.
 * 7) The surviving mutineers are left on the island, while Silver and the loyal crew sail home. On the way home, Silver slips out one night with some of the treasure, and is never heard from again.

Student Contributor
Goodfellow, Andrew '08