Robinson Crusoe
Robinson Crusoe is a
novel by
Daniel Defoe, first published in 1719 and sometimes regarded as the
first novel in English. The book is a fictional
autobiography of the
title character, an
English castaway who spends 28 years on a remote
island, encountering
savages,
captives, and
mutineers before being rescued. This device, presenting an account of supposedly factual events, is known as a "
false document", and gives a realistic
frame to the story.
The full title of the novel is
The Life and Strange Surprising 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 strangely deliver'd by Pirates. Written by Himself.
The book was first published on
April 25 1719. The positive reception was immediate and universal. Before the end of the year, this first volume had run through four editions. Within years, it had reached an audience as wide as any book ever written in English.
By the end of the 19th century, no book in the history of
Western literature had spawned more editions, spin-offs, and translations (even into languages such as
Inuit,
Coptic, and
Maltese) than
Robinson Crusoe, with more than 700 such alternative versions, including children's versions with mainly pictures and no text.
[Ian Watt. "Robinson Crusoe as a Myth", from Essays in Criticism (April 1951). Reprinted in the Norton Critical Edition (second edition, 1994) of Robinson Crusoe.] There have been hundreds of adaptations in dozens of languages, from the
Swiss Family Robinson to
Luis Buñuel's
film adaption.
J.M. Coetzee's 1986 novel,
Foe, is a reimagining, retelling, and reevaluation of the story. The term "
Robinsonade" has even been coined to describe the various spin-offs of
Robinson Crusoe.
Defoe went on to write a lesser-known sequel,
The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe. It was intended to be the last part of his stories, according to the original title-page of its first edition, but in fact a third part, entitled
Serious Reflections of Robinson Crusoe, was written; it is a mostly-forgotten series of moral essays with Crusoe's name attached to give interest.
There were many stories of real-life
castaways in Defoe's time. Defoe's inspiration for Crusoe was a Scottish sailor named
Alexander Selkirk, who was rescued in 1709 by
Woodes Rogers' expedition after four years on the uninhabited island of
Juan Fernández off the
Chilean coast. Rogers's "
Cruising Voyage" was published in 1712, with an account of Alexander Selkirk's ordeal. However,
Robinson Crusoe is far from a copy of Woodes Roger's account. Selkirk was abandoned at his own request, while Crusoe was shipwrecked. The islands are different. Selkirk lived alone for the whole time, while Crusoe found companions. Furthermore, much of the appeal of Defoe's novel is the detailed and captivating account of Crusoe's thoughts, occupations and activities which goes far beyond that of Rogers' basic descriptions of Selkirk, which account for only a few pages.
Other real-life castaways were reduced to an extremely primitive condition, or lost the use of speech, in a space of a few years. One report describes a Frenchman who, after two years of solitude on
Mauritius, tore his clothing to pieces in a fit of madness brought on by a diet of nothing but raw
turtles. Another story tells of a
Dutch seaman who was left alone on the island of
Saint Helena as punishment. He fell into such despair that he disinterred the body of a buried comrade and he set out to sea in the coffin (
Mandelslo, 1662: 246). Another
castaway, the Spaniard
Pedro Serrano, was rescued after seven years of solitude in the 1520s, according to
Rycaut and
Secord. In
1722/
1723 one
Philip Ashton from
New England stayed sixteen months utterly alone on
Roatan Island before he was rescued; later the castaway wrote a book about his adventures. There is also an intriguing story of a Dutch ship's officer,
Leendert Hasenbosch, who was set ashore on uninhabited
Ascension Island on 5 May
1725 as a punishment for
sodomy. Hasenbosch probably died of thirst (or suicide) after about half a year. Hasenbosch wrote a diary that was found by British mariners in January
1726.
Despite its simple narrative style and the absence of the supposedly indispensable
love motive, it was well received in the literary world. The book is considered one of the most widely published books in history (behind some of the religious texts). It has been a hit since the day it was published, into modern times.
Novelist
James Joyce eloquently noted that the true symbol of the
British conquest is Robinson Crusoe: "He is the true prototype of the British colonist… The whole
Anglo-Saxon spirit is in Crusoe: the manly independence, the unconscious cruelty, the persistence, the slow yet efficient intelligence, the sexual apathy, the calculating
taciturnity".
According to
J.P. Hunter, Robinson is not a hero, but an
everyman. He begins as a wanderer, aimless on a sea he does not understand; he ends as a
pilgrim, crossing a final mountain to enter the
promised land. The book tells the story of how Robinson gets closer to
God, not through listening to sermons in a church but through spending time alone amongst nature with only a
Bible to read. This view was not welcomed by the established
Anglican church of the time, which thought the message in the book was anarchic and close to
heresy. Defoe's views are reflected in those of
Christian anarchism.
Robinson Crusoe is filled with religious aspects. Defoe was himself a
Puritan moralist, and normally worked in the guide tradition, writing books on how to be a good Puritan Christian, such as
The New Family Instructor (1727) and
Religious Courtship (1722). While
Robinson Crusoe is far more than a guide, it shares many of the same themes and theological and moral points of view. The very name "Crusoe" may have been taken from Timothy Cruso, a classmate of Defoe's who had written guide books himself, including
God the Guide of Youth (1695), before dying at an early age — just eight years before Defoe wrote
Robinson Crusoe. Cruso would still have been remembered by contemporaries and the association with guide books is clear. It has even been suggested that
God the Guide of Youth inspired
Robinson Crusoe because of a number of passages in that work that are closely tied to the novel; however this is speculative.
[Hunter, J. Paul (1966) The Reluctant Pilgrim. As found in Norton Critical Edition (see References).]The book proved so popular that the names of the two main protagonists have entered the language. The term "Robinson Crusoe" is virtually synonymous with the word "castaway" and is often used as a metaphor for being or doing something alone. Robinson Crusoe usually referred to his servant as "my man Friday", from which the term "
Man Friday" (or "Girl Friday") originated, referring to a personal assistant, servant or companion.
In
Jean-Jacques Rousseau's treatise on education,
Emile, or Education, the main character, Emile, is allowed to read only one book before the age of twelve,
Robinson Crusoe. Rousseau wants Emile to identify himself as Crusoe, required to rely upon himself for all of his needs. In Rousseau's view, Emile needs to imitate Crusoe's experience, allowing necessity to determine what is to be learned and accomplished. This is one of the main themes of Rousseau's educational model.
Nobel Prize-winning (2003) author
J. M. Coetzee in 1986 published a novel entitled
Foe, in which he explores an alternative telling of the Crusoe story, an allegorical story about racism, philosophy, and colonialism.
Jacques Offenbach wrote an
opéra comique called
Robinson Crusoé which was first performed at the
Opéra-Comique,
Salle Favart on
23 November 1867. This was based on the British pantomime version rather than the novel itself. The libretto was by
Eugène Cormon and
Hector-Jonathan Crémieux.
Crusoe leaves
England on a sea voyage in September 1651 against the wishes of his parents. The ship is taken over by
Salè pirates and Crusoe becomes the slave of a
Moor. He manages to escape with a
boat and is befriended by the Captain of a
Portuguese ship off the western coast of
Africa. The ship is en route to
Brazil. There with the help of the Captain, Crusoe becomes owner of a
plantation.
He joins an expedition to bring
slaves from Africa, but he is
shipwrecked in a storm about forty miles out to sea on an
island near the mouth of the
Orinoco river on
September 30 1659. His companions all die; he manages to fetch arms, tools and other supplies from the ship before it breaks apart and sinks. He proceeds to build a fenced-in habitation and cave, keeps a
calendar by making marks in a piece of wood. He hunts, grows
corn, learns to make
pottery, raises
goats, etc. He reads the
Bible and slowly becomes religious, thanking God for his fate in which nothing is missing but society.
He discovers native
cannibals occasionally visit the island to kill and eat
prisoners. At first he plans to kill the savages for their abomination, but then he realizes that he has no right to do so as the cannibals have not attacked him and do not knowingly commit a
crime. He
dreams of capturing one or two
servants by freeing some prisoners, and indeed, when a prisoner manages to
escape, Crusoe helps him, naming his new companion "Friday" after the day of the week he appeared, and teaches him
English and converts him to Christianity.
After another party of natives arrive to partake in a grisly feast, Crusoe and Friday manage to kill most of the natives and save two of the prisoners. One is Friday's father and the other is a Spaniard, who informs Crusoe that there are other Spaniards shipwrecked on the mainland. A plan is devised where the Spaniard would return with Friday's father to the mainland and bring back the others, build a ship, and sail to a Spanish port.
Before the Spaniards return, an English ship appears;
mutineers have taken control of the ship and intend to
maroon their former
captain on the island. The captain and Crusoe manage to retake the ship. They leave for England, leaving behind three of the mutineers to fend for themselves and inform the Spaniards what happened. Crusoe leaves the island on
December 19 1686. He travels to Portugal to find his old friend, the Captain, who informs him that his Brazilian plantation was well cared for and he has become wealthy. From Portugal, he travels overland to England, to avoid mishaps at sea, via
Spain and
France; during winter in the
Pyrenees, he and his companions have to fend off an attack by vicious
wolves. Back in England, he decides to sell his plantation, as returning to Brazil would entail converting to
Catholicism. Later in life, after marrying, having three children and becoming widowed, he returns to his island for a last time. The book ends with a hint about a sequel that would detail his return to the island, which had been discovered.
*
castaway*
RobinsonadeRobinson Crusoe on MarsClassic, famous island/seafaring novels for children
*
Treasure Island (1883), by
Robert Louis Stevenson*
The Swiss Family Robinson (1812), by
Johann David Wyss*Shinagel, Michael, ed. (1994).
Robinson Crusoe. Norton Critical Edition. ISBN 0393964523. Includes textual annotations, contemporary and modern criticisms, bibliography.
*
Free ebook of Robinson Crusoe at
Project Gutenberg*
Robinson Crusoe (London: W. Taylor, 1719)., commented text of the first edition, free at
Editions Marteau.
*
Free eBook of Robinson Crusoe RSS version.
*
Free eBook of Robinson Crusoe with illustrations by
N. C. Wyeth*
Free audiobook of Robinson Crusoe from
Librivox*
Robinson Crusoe, told in words of one syllable, by
Lucy Aikin (aka "
Mary Godolphin") (1723-1764).
* http://www.digbib.org/Daniel_Defoe_1661/The_Further_Adventures_Of_Robinson_Crusoe The text of volume II.
