This Hampstead plaque commemorates the Edinburgh-born writer of The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde, Mount Vernon, NW3 – keep an eye out for this one if you're joining David on the (largely Halloween-free) Hampstead Walk this morning.
Hampstead is not alone in laying claim to a flake of the legacy of Scotland’s most critically respected 19th Century writer. I have met London Walkers on the Hampstead Walk from such wildly contrasting locations as Monterey, Bournemouth and Samoa who have all enjoyed claiming a bit of RLS’s story as their own.
A restless soul, thanks in part to the ill-health that took him around the globe in search of a clement environment in which to live and work, Hampstead was just one port of call in a short but well-travelled life – the dates on his Hampstead plaque tell us not how long he was a Hampsteadite but how long he lived in total, a mere 44 years.
In this Halloween month, it is worth remembering that his most enduring popular work, The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde, although inspired by the architectural and social schizophrenia of his native Edinburgh, is set in the mean streets of Soho.
Our Halloween London Walks…
A London Walk costs £10 – £8 concession. To join a London Walk, simply meet your guide at the designated tube station at the appointed time. Details of all London Walks can be found at www.walks.com.
