Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe with pictures and images by Offterdinger and Zweigle
Robinson Crusoe is one of the best known classic works in world literature. It was reprinted, translated and adapted countless times what is one of the most obvious signs of a masterpiece.
Today we will focus on pictures (images) only. They were done for loose adaptation by Joachim Heinrich Camp (1746-1818) who made a small fortune with it. He, as an experienced private teacher, clearly knew how to aim this work at young readers and all graphic material support this goal as well.
Carl Offterdinger (1829-1889) was one of the top genre painters and illustrators of his time. He illustrated dogs of fairy tales and several other adventure stories, so Robinson Crusoe perfectly fit his style. The cover and all color illustrations are his work.
Black and white illustrations were done by Walter Zweigle (1859-1904) who is best known by his illustrations of Karl May's works (he also illustrated other historical and adventure books).
Some of these illustrations are already available on the internet but they are not appropriately marked. The authorship is not clear and we can only guess about the order in the book as it was published by Effenberger, Stuttgart in 1898.
So here you have them: color ones by Offterdinger, The rest by Zweigle, published in the same sequence as they are arranged in the book. If you find them interesting, share this post with your friends. A lot of time was investigated in the research, scanning, editing, etc. so it would be great to show them to a wide audience as possible.
Here are some more facts about the Robinson Crusoe:
- Full title of the novel, as written by original author Daniel Defoe (1660-1731), is: The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an uninhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last as strongly deliver'd by Pyrates.
- The story was inspired by real castaway Alexander Selkirk from Scotland who spent five years on the island then known Mas a Tierra, today named (surprise, surprise) Robinson Crusoe Island (Isla Robinson Crusoe). But Defoe decided to put 'his' island in the Caribbean Sea. It is also very likely Defoe used several other survival stories as an inspiration for his masterpiece. The one which definitely should be mentioned more often is the story about Henry Pitman, who was shipwrecked in the Caribbean (!) and wrote a short book about his adventures in the wilderness. There is a very strong possibility Defoe personally knew Pitman before he wrote the novel about Robinson.
- Author and publisher (William Taylor) decided at first to publish the novel without Defoe's (which, by the way, is a pseudonym, his real surname is Foe) name. It was presented as a real autobiography of a man named Crusoe. This name was probably taken after Defoe's classmate Timothy Cruso who was writing guide books. A large percentage of the audience never believed the adventures in the book really happened and somebody wrote a book where he revealed the lies behind the written events less than a year after publishing The 'Robinson Crusoe'.
- The book was a huge success and Daniel Defoe tried to follow a good punch with more: he wrote two sequences. The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe and Serious Reflections of Robinson Crusoe remained almost unknown to the readers and are almost forgotten today. This didn't stop Daniel Defoe, who used more than one hundred pseudonyms for his numerous writings, including Moll Flanders, another masterpiece with enormous success.
- Hundreds of authors used the format of Robinson Crusoe to write more or less original works with the same basic plot. They still do that. We have also seen numerous movies made after the novel, the scripts based on retellings or original scripts with the basically the same story. To be honest Robinson Crusoe by Defoe wasn't the first book on the theme. Oldest known 'Robinsonade' was The Improvement of Human Reason: Exhibited in the Life of Hai Ebn Yokdhan written by a Moor living in Spain. Defoe was very likely familiar with the work.
- Today Robinson Crusoe is less seen as a romantic hero and more as a representation of British imperialism. The characteristics of British (later expanded to Western colonialism) are seen in the title character, his pattern of behavior, his relation with Friday, a savage on the island, with who he had a pretty friendly, yet totally patronizing relationship (first thing he did, was naming for his own comfort, completely negotiating Friday's personal history and background), etc. This adds an interesting layer of controversy to Robinson Crusoe as a classic literary work, officially the first British novel and the cornerstone of realistic fiction at the same time.