First published in 1812, The Swiss Family Robinson was inspired by Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, and was intended to instruct author Johann David Wyss’s sons about the Christian faith, family values, and self-reliance. In the more than two centuries since its publication, The Swiss Family Robinson has been translated and reprinted numerous times, and has been adapted for comics, television and film.
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Johann David Wyss was a Swiss writer best known for his children’s classic The Swiss Family Robinson. A pastor in Bern, Switzerland, Wyss’s writing was influenced by his four sons, and was intended to serve as a moral guide for self-reliance, farming, cooperation, and frugality. Wyss died in 1818 at the age of 74, six years after the publication of The Swiss Family Robinson.