Robinson Crusoe

The story

Against his father's advice, Robinson Crusoe goes to sea. After pirates, slavery and a plantation in Brazil, he is shipwrecked as the only survivor on an island near the mouth of the Orinoco.

For twenty-eight years he builds a life alone: a fortified home, crops, goats, a calendar cut into a post — until one day he finds a single human footprint in the sand.

Themes: self-reliance, faith, isolation, colonialism.

Why it's a good book for language learners

Defoe's English is nearly three hundred years old, with long sentences and some old spelling, so this is a book for confident readers. The reward is very concrete vocabulary: tools, food, weather and work, described in careful detail day by day.

What you'll practise

• Daily routines and work vocabulary
• Lists and practical description
• 18th-century sentence structure
• Diary and journal style

Did you know?

It is often called the first English novel, and it was a bestseller from the year it appeared.

The PageWalker adventure

In the adventure you make Crusoe's survival choices — and some mistakes on the island cannot be undone. The first page is free to play in your browser, and the adventure is available in 13 languages with click-to-translate.

Robinson Crusoe in other languages

• EnglishRobinson Crusoe
• العربيةروبنسون كروزو
• DeutschRobinson Crusoe
• EspañolRobinson Crusoe
• FrançaisRobinson Crusoé
• हिन्दीरॉबिन्सन क्रूसो
• ItalianoRobinson Crusoe
• 日本語ロビンソン・クルーソー
• 한국어로빈슨 크루소
• PortuguêsRobinson Crusoé
• РусскийРобинзон Крузо
• TürkçeRobinson Crusoe
• 简体中文鲁滨逊漂流记