The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss

The luckiest castaways ever

Daniel Defoe’s novel Robinson Crusoe, published in 1719, was one of the first novels in the English language, and it had a huge influence on subsequent literature. It even established its own international genre of like-minded survival stories, known as “robinsonades,” a category that includes everything from The Lord of the Flies to Gilligan’s Island, among many others. One of the earlier and best-known robinsonades is The Swiss Family Robinson by Swiss author John David Wyss, published in four volumes from 1812 to 1827.

In 1798, the French Revolution spills over into Switzerland, bringing a wave of secularization with it. As a result, a Swiss clergyman is stripped of his fortune. He decides to emigrate with his family to start a new life in Australia. During a heavy storm, the vessel carrying them wrecks on some rocks somewhere in the East Indies. The crew flees the wreck in the lifeboats, abandoning the Swiss family to their own devices. The wrecked ship fails to sink, and when the weather clears, the family—father, mother, and four sons—make their way to a nearby island that appears previously undiscovered and uninhabited. Alone on this deserted isle, with no rescue expected, they must learn to survive and settle in for the long haul. The surname of the family in question is never specified, but, since they’re Swiss, it’s unlike they were the Robinsons. The inclusion of “Robinson” in the title is merely a tribute to Robinson Crusoe.

If there is a moral to The Swiss Family Robinson it is that “the good Lord will provide,” and boy, does He ever! Much like the original Crusoe, the family has access to their wrecked vessel, which serves as a veritable hardware store, grocery, and Noah’s ark. The bounty of this undiscovered isle also defies belief, as the family is practically showered with beneficial plants and animals. These gifts they industriously employ in the development of all manner of civilized technologies to ensure their health, comfort, and joy. After reading chapter after chapter of the family’s always-successful efforts in engineering, agriculture, and science, the reader would not be surprised if they built a bamboo pedal car like Gilligan used to drive around his island. They do manage to build a home inside a tree that resembles the Berenstain Bears’ abode. The tone of The Swiss Family Robinson is relentlessly pious and cheerful. While some of the original Crusoe’s McGyver-like accomplishments defied belief, at least they were balanced by hardships. On the Swiss family’s “Happy Island,” there are no hardships. Content with the hand they’ve been dealt, the family makes no attempt to facilitate a rescue, such as building a signal fire. The parents don’t seem to mind that their sons will all die virgins in remote isolation.

Robinson Crusoe had its share of religious sermonizing in the form of the hero’s quasi-Transcendentalist philosophical musings on God and Nature. The Swiss Family Robinson is equally pious if not more so, but the preaching comes in the form of familiar, simplified church-going platitudes. The book was likely aimed at a young audience, but the father and mother also seem designed to instruct adults in proper parenthood. Wyss repetitively imparts certain moral lessons—Be industrious, Give thanks to God, and Love your mother—couched in an entertaining and inviting story. Although Robinson Crusoe is the better work of literature, The Swiss Family Robinson may be the better adventure story for the masses, even though any dangerous sharp edges have been sanded down by the relentless optimism. This isn’t always the most intelligent book, but it is amusing. One can understand why film studios have adapted this novel into several movies and television series over the years.

Two Little Misogynists by Carl Spitteler

Mischievous Swiss kids

Carl Spitteler

Swiss writer Carl Spitteler won the 1919 Nobel Prize in Literature, primarily on the strength of his poetry, including his epic work Olympian Spring. English-language readers searching for works by the early, lesser-known Nobel Laureates, however, are often at the mercy of whatever obscure gems someone many decades ago happened to consider worthy of translation. In Spitteler’s case, the only work available in English is not a poem but a novel. Originally published in 1907 under the German title of Die Mädchenfeinde, the English version bears the unlikely title of Two Little Misogynists. The 1922 edition published by Henry Holt and Company is a brief book of 132 pages, with around 20 of those pages devoted to illustrations.

Though the title may be a bit off-putting to today’s audience, the two misogynists referred to in the title are merely two young brothers who, like many boys their age, think girls are icky. Gerold, age 10, and Hänsli, age 9, have been spending a vacation at their grandparents’ house in the village of Sentisbrugg, but the time has come for them to reluctantly return to the military school they attend in the city of Aarmünsterburg. Much to their chagrin, they are informed that for a portion of their trip they will be sharing a ride with a girl their age named Gesima, the daughter of an important local magistrate. The novel is a road-trip story detailing the adventures of the three children on this journey.

Though good boys at heart, the brothers are troublemakers to some degree, like a milder version of the Katzenjammer Kids, if anyone remembers that old comic strip. Their first inclination upon meeting Gesima is to pick on her, but over time, not surprisingly, they develop warmer feelings for her. Gesima in her turn begins to show the inklings of feminine wiles and toys with the boys in retaliation. In early 20th-century Switzerland, it apparently took a village to raise the youngsters, because they are shuttled into the hands of a different group of adults with each town they pass through, but they periodically manage to escape to undertake their own independent exploits in the picturesque Swiss countryside.

Two Little Misogynists is mostly charming, sometimes boring, and often seems as if some of its humor has been lost in translation or is just intentionally absurd. There’s nothing particularly wrong with the book, but it never truly impresses either. Mostly it just comes across as a harmless piece of fluff and not the kind of work that would have in any way contributed to Spitteler’s Nobel win. One can venture that the book is perhaps autobiographically based on Spitteler’s own childhood memories of growing up in Switzerland, though with events exaggerated for comedic effect. One doesn’t learn a whole lot about Swiss culture, however. The illustrations probably do more to establish the specificity of the Swiss setting than does the text. One wishes to learn more about the lives of the adult characters, but they exist only in the periphery while the author tells the tale from a child’s perspective. To that end, Spitteler does demonstrate a knack for capturing the naive wonder of the juvenile mind. This brief work of prose may be far from the Nobel-caliber epic verse for which Spitteler is known, but it does make for a pleasantly lighthearted read.

Illustration by A. Helene Carter, from Two Little Misogynists by Carl Spitteler, 1922 English edition published by Henry Holt and Company

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