New Robinson. Complete edition with notes

Louis de Rougemont, real name Henri-Louis Grin (1847-1921), is an enigmatic figure in the world of adventure literature. Originally from Switzerland, he ended up in Australia in 1870, where he worked a variety of jobs: dishwasher, waiter, realtor, broker, but mainly photographer. Later, he became the owner of a small ship that was shipwrecked. Having disappeared for many years, Grin returned with a sensational story: he claimed to have survived an attack by aborigines and spent decades on a desert island, where the natives worshiped him as a deity. This edition presents his novel The New Robinson, which was published in 1898 by the British World Magazine as a series of essays about the adventures of a certain Louis de Rougemont. The publishers presented these stories as real events, which aroused great interest among the public. In them, the hero describes his search for pearls and gold in New Guinea, his meeting with the natives, and his thirty-year existence among the aborigines. But soon the veracity of the stories was questioned: critics saw in them a mixture of colonial folklore, exotic myths, and pure fiction. A heated debate broke out in society that lasted for several years. In the end, Rougemont was exposed as a fraud, but this scandal only fueled interest in his stories and provided the publishers with impressive profits. This novel is not just a journey into unknown lands, but also a fascinating mystification, a reminder of how the line between reality and fiction can turn into the greatest literary adventure.