The Swiss Family Robinson: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

The Swiss Family Robinson, credited to Johann David Wyss, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

Librivox recording of The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss. Read by Mark F. Smith. The Swiss Family Robinson has delighted generations of readers with its exciting tale of a family which, though shipwrecked, displays “the right stuff” and builds a charming colony that later, they do not want to leave. Cut off from the comforts and companionship of other humans, they use a familiarity with natural history and biology to find the resources and build the tools to construct a canoe, weave cloth, irrigate a garden, and turn an immense hollow tree into a lofty house with a spiral staircase. They domesticate buffaloes, wild asses, and monkeys. They establish farms and plantations. And finally, they have a terrifying encounter with natives from a nearby island. Johann David Wyss, the author, did not live to complete his tale. Storytellers over the years have injected so many episodes into the various versions that probably none closely match the original. (Indeed, the Baroness de Montholieu expanded the book from two volumes into five when she translated it into French.) This effort was re-translated into English in 1849 by W.H.G. Kingston, abridging the edition severely. It follows the British sensibilities of the period in terms of sentence structure and emphasis. (Summary by Mark F. Smith)

Recording facts

• Recording title: The Swiss Family Robinson
• Author credits: Johann David Wyss
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 52
• Listed recording duration: 12:45:14

Catalogue topics

• swiss family robinson
• wyss

Opening tracks: first 24 of 52

1. Introduction & Chapter 1 — 18:47
2. Chapter 02 — 21:20
3. Chapter 03 — 18:04
4. Chapter 04 — 15:02
5. Chapter 05 — 9:52
6. Chapter 06 — 6:44
7. Chapter 07 — 9:06
8. Chapter 08 — 10:03
9. Chapter 09 — 9:58
10. Chapter 10 — 9:11
11. Chapter 11-12 — 19:14
12. Chapter 13-14 — 10:50
13. Chapter 15-16 — 10:25
14. Chapter 17-18 — 12:22
15. Chapter 19 — 12:45
16. Chapter 20 — 11:03
17. Chapter 21 — 13:14
18. Chapter 22 — 9:10
19. chapter 23 — 8:40
20. Chapter 24 — 17:35
21. Chapter 25 — 14:58
22. Chapter 26 — 13:37
23. Chapter 27 — 12:08
24. Chapter 28 — 11:34

Listen to this recording

Open the complete recording and player on Internet Archive. The player includes the full track list and available download formats.

Source and rights

This is a record from LibriVox's official Internet Archive collection, with a public-domain licence recorded in its metadata. LibriVox's policy includes its catalogue summaries as well as its recordings. Its public-domain assessment follows United States law; copyright status can differ elsewhere. The summary and track facts are reproduced and reformatted from that record. Dates attached to the archive upload are not treated as original book publication dates.