Delighted with the incredible success of Robinson Crusoe, Defoe followed it four months later with Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1719) and shortly thereafter with Serious Reflections during the life and Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe: with his Vision of the Angelick World (1720). Neither of the sequels attained the popularity of the first volume. Farther Adventures of Robinson Crusoe is an account of Crusoe’s later voyages, including a return to the island to see what has happened to it in his absence. As in the first book, Crusoe attributes his successful ventures to the workings of Providence. Serious Reflections, unlike the first two books, is a moralizing treatise, a manual of piety that owes more to the conduct book than to the travel narrative. This third book was even less popular than the second, because it contained none of the exciting adventures that Defoe’s readers expected.
Like many other popular novels, Defoe’s book has attracted the attention of the film industry; to date, eight films based on the Crusoe story have been made in four different countries. The first film was the silent Robinson Crusoe (1927), a British effort. Variations on the Crusoe idea followed: Robinson Crusoe of Mystery Island (1936), The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1954), Robinson Crusoe on Mars (1964), and Robinson Crusoe and the Tiger (1972), an odd version told from the point of view of a tiger. The most straightforward of the films is Luis Bunuel’s The Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, filmed in Mexico.
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