the experience of reading in Britain, from 1450 to 1945...

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Johann David Wyss : Swiss Family Robinson

'[Rose Macaulay] relished such island shipwreck stories as Swiss Family Robinson'

Century: 1850-1899     Reader/Listener/Group: Rose Macaulay      Print: Book

Johann David Wyss : The Swiss Family Robinson

On 8 September 1854 Christiana Thompson noted in her diary that her children Elizabeth and Alice (later Alice Meynell) were 'reading every day with their Pa Swiss Family Robinson.'

Century: 1850-1899     Reader/Listener/Group: Thompson Family     Print: Book

Johann David Wyss : The Family Robinson Crusoe: Or, Journal of a Father Shipwrecked, with his Wife and Children, on an Uninhabited Island

'Sunday August 20th. [...] Read Swiss Family Robinson Crusoe.'

Century: 1800-1849     Reader/Listener/Group: Claire Clairmont      Print: Book

Johann Wyss : The Swiss Family Robinson

'On the sewing machine lay Jack's library book, a dirty brown object disguised in a uniform binding with gilt numbers on the back. I picked it up, opened it at the first page, and began to read The Swiss Family Robinson. It is an understatement to say that I began to read. I stepped into another life. I was one of the family on the wrecked ship, passing through the barrier of words, enlarging my small suburban existence by this new dimension.'

Century: 1900-1945     Reader/Listener/Group: Richard Church      Print: Book

Johann Wyss : The Swiss Family Robinson

'I read the whole of Swiss Family Robinson, and was not deterred by the bloodstain which had obliterated half the print on a page in the middle of the book, at the point where Ernest fitted retractable blinkers to the ostrich, so that he could guid to to right or left while seated on its back, riding the whirlwind. I read the book four times before venturing further.'

Century: 1900-1945     Reader/Listener/Group: Richard Church      Print: Book

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