Stevenson’s second longer work of fiction is the greatest imaginable jump from the buccaneering story of Treasure Island with which he first came before a large public. Prince Otto is difficult to classify; it is not, as R. L. S. wrote, ‘ a romance, nor yet a comedy, nor yet a romantic comedy, but a kind of preparation of some of the elements of all these in a glass jar.’ It is, more than anything else, a piece of Stevenson’s paradoxical philosophy wrought into a story which, for one thing, has a very slender interest and, for another, is all the while very near to being overwhelmed by the rich beauty of its writing. Stevenson’s theme seems to be: Let us have done with this artificial life of courts which chokes a man’s healthy tastes, and is a breeding ground for vanity and scandal. Such is the interpretation which the story bears from his declaration to Henley that ‘ the romance lies precisely in the freeing of two spirits from these court intrigues.’ The delicacy with which this motive is woven into the picture of the affairs of Otto and his princess may justify the opinion, often expressed, that the book is the touchstone for the true Stevensonian.
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