30 Victorian Heartthrobs Who Made Ladies Sigh

Robert Louis Stevenson was thin, sickly, restless, and somehow wildly romantic because the 19th century adored a fragile man with adventure in his lungs. He chased health across climates, wrote Treasure Island and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, and made literary wandering look noble instead of medically alarming. His appeal was not brute force. It was intensity, imagination, and the sense he might cough beautifully before boarding a ship.